when the wood has been found, when all
external things are propitious, when the very heavens have lent their
aid, it is so often that it is impossible! It is not only that your
Ariel is untrained, but that the special Ariel which you may chance to
own is no better than a rustic hobgoblin or a pease-blossom, or mustard
seed at the best. You cannot get the pace of the racehorse from a
farmyard colt, train him as you will. How often is one prompted to fling
one's self down in despair, and, weeping between the branches, to
declare that it is not that the thoughts will wander, it is not that the
mind is treacherous! That which it can do, it will do; but the pace
required from it should be fitted only for the farmyard. Nevertheless,
before all be given up, let a walk in the wood be tried."

Much has been said about the quality of Mr. Trollope's work. There seems
a consensus of opinion that it degenerated. "Mr. Trollope," says Mr.
Freeman, "had certainly gone far to write himself out. His later work is
far from being so good as his earlier. But, after all, his worst work is
better than a great many other people's best; and considering the way in
which it was done, it is wonderful that it was done at all. I, myself,
know what fixed hours of work are, and their value; but I could not
undertake to write about William Rufus or Appius Claudius up to a
certain moment on the clock, and to stop at that moment. I suppose it
was from his habits of official business that Mr. Trollope learned to do
it, and every man undoubtedly knows best how to do his own work. Still,
it is strange that works of imagination did not suffer by such a way of
doing."

James Payn said that Trollope injured his reputation by publishing his
methods of writing. Likewise, the _Daily News_, in referring to Alphonse
Daudet's history of his own novels, doubted whether he acted wisely. As
the editor said, "An effect of almost too elaborate art, a feeling that
we are looking at a mosaic painfully made up of little pieces picked out
of real life and fitted together, has often been present to the
consciousness of M. Daudet's readers. That feeling is justified by his
description of his creative efforts."

M. Daudet's earlier works were light and humorous, like "Tartarin," or
they were idyllic and full of Provencal scenery, the nature and the
nightingales of M. Daudet's birthplace, the south. One night at the
theatre, when watching the splendid failure of an idyllic Pro