ngish account by Jacques of
his association with a travelling quack and fortune-teller, which at
once reminds one of _Japhet in Search of a Father_. The resemblances and
the differences are almost equally characteristic.

[56] Of course I am not comparing him with Paul on any other point.

[57] Except in regard to the historical and other matters noticed above,
hardly at all.

[58] For a picture of an actual grisette, drawn by perhaps the greatest
master of artistic realism (adjective and substantive so seldom found in
company!) who ever lived, see that _Britannia_ article of Thackeray's
before referred to--an article, for a long time, unreprinted, and
therefore, till a comparatively short time ago, practically unknown.
This and its companion articles from the _Britannia_ and the _Corsair_,
all of 1840-41, but summarising ten or twelve years' knowledge of Paris,
form, with the same author's _Paris Sketch Book_ (but as representing a
more mature state of his genius), the best commentary on Paul de Kock.
They may be found together in the third volume of the Oxford Thackeray
edited by the present writer.

[59] Unless they start from the position that an English writer on the
French novel is bound to follow--or at least to pay express attention
to--French criticism of it. This position I respectfully but unalterably
decline to accept. A critical tub that has no bottom of its own is the
very worst Danaid's vessel in all the household gear of literature.

[60] The scene and society are German, but the author knows the name to
have been originally English.

[61] Such, perhaps, as Gibbon himself may have used while he "sighed as
a lover" and before he "obeyed as a son." It should perhaps be said that
Mme. de Montolieu produced many other books, mostly translations--among
the latter a French version of _The Swiss Family Robinson_.

[62] In dealing with "Sensibility" earlier, it was pointed out how
extensively things were dealt with by _letter_. In such cases as these
the fashion came in rather usefully.

[63] The treatment of the authors here mentioned, _infra_, will, I hope,
show that the introduction of their names is not merely "promiscuous."

[64] I am quite prepared to be told that this was somebody else or
nobody at all. "Moi, je dis Madame de Genlis."

[65] P. 436.

[66] The kind endeavours of the Librarian of the London Library to
obtain some in Paris itself were fruitless, but the old saying about
neglectin