p-trap
element in Hugo. I confess that it seems to me to go deeper into his
work than you would apparently allow. I think it, for example, very
palpable even in _Notre Dame_, and I doubt the historical fidelity
though my ignorance of mediaeval history prevents me from putting my
finger on many faults. The consequence is that in my opinion you are
scarcely just to Scott or Fielding as compared with Hugo. Granting
fully his amazing force and fire, he seems to me to be deficient
often in that kind of healthy realism which is so admirable in
Scott's best work. For example, though my Scotch blood (for I can
boast of some) may prejudice me I am profoundly convinced that
Balfour of Burley would have knocked M. Lantenac into a cocked hat
and stormed la Tourgue if it had been garrisoned by 19 x 19 French
spouters of platitude in half the time that Gauvain and Cimourdain
took about it. In fact, Balfour seems to me to be flesh and blood
and Gauvain & Co. to be too often mere personified bombast: and
therefore I fancy that _Old Mortality_ will outlast '93, though
_Notre Dame_ is far better than _Quentin Durward_, and _Les
Miserables_, perhaps, better than any. This is, of course, fair
matter of opinion.

Thirdly, I don't think that you quite bring out your meaning in
saying that '93 is a decisive symptom. I confess that I don't quite
see in what sense it decides precisely what question. A sentence or
so would clear this up.

Fourthly, as a matter of form, I think (but I am very doubtful) that
it might possibly have been better not to go into each novel in
succession; but to group the substance of your remarks a little
differently. Of course I don't want you to alter the form, I merely
notice the point as suggesting a point in regard to any future
article.

Many of your criticisms in detail strike me as very good. I was much
pleased by your remarks on the storm in the _Travailleurs_. There
was another very odd storm, as it struck me on a hasty reading in
'93, where there is mention of a beautiful summer evening and yet
the wind is so high that you can't hear the tocsin. You do justice
also and more than justice to Hugo's tenderness about children.
That, I think, points to one great source of his power.

It would be curious to compare Hugo to a much smaller man, Chas.
Reade, who