by
placing before you a list of the names of all existing British authors
whose reputation can be regarded as of any wide extent, as follows:--

Tennyson, Thackeray, Grote, McCulloch,
Carlyle, Bulwer, Macaulay, Hamilton,
Dickens, Alison, J. S. Mill, Faraday.

[Footnote 1: This I had from Captain Marryat himself.]

This list is very small as compared with that presented in the same field
five-and-thirty years since, and its difference in weight is still greater
than in number. Scott, the novelist and poet, may certainly be regarded as
the counterpoise of much more than any one of the writers of fiction in
this list. Byron, Moore, Rogers, and Campbell enjoyed a degree of
reputation far exceeding that of Tennyson. Wellington, the historian of
his own campaigns, would much outweigh any of the historians. Malthus and
Ricardo were founders of a school that has greatly influenced the policy
of the world, whereas McCulloch and Mill are but disciples in that school.
Dalton, Davy, and Wollaston will probably occupy a larger space in the
history of science than Sir Michael Faraday, large, even, as may be that
assigned to him.

Extraordinary as is the existence of such a state of things in a country
claiming so much to abound in wealth, it is yet more extraordinary that we
look around in vain to see who are to replace even these when age or death
shall withdraw them from the literary world. Of all here named,
Mr. Thackeray is the only one that has risen to reputation in the last ten
years, and he is no longer young; and even he seeks abroad that reward for
his efforts which is denied to him by the "cheap labor" system at home. Of
the others, nearly, if not quite all, have been for thirty years before
the world, and, in the natural course of things, some of them must
disappear from the stage of authorship, if not of life. If we seek their
successors among the writers for the weekly or monthly journals, we shall
certainly fail to find them. Looking to the Reviews, we find ourselves
forced to agree with the English journalist, who informs his readers that
"it is said, and with apparent justice, that the quarterlies are not as
good as they were." From year to year they have less the appearance of
being the production of men who looked to any thing beyond mere pecuniary
compensation for their labor. In reading them we find ourselves compelled
to agree with the reviewer who regrets to see that t