d, especially, to mingle the marvelous rather as
a slight, delicate and evanescent flavor than as any
portion of the actual substance of the dish offered to the
public. The point of view in which this tale comes under
the romantic definition lies in the attempt to connect a
by-gone time with the very present that is flitting away
from us. It is a legend, prolonging itself from an epoch
now gray in the distance, down into our own broad daylight,
and bringing along with it some of its legendary mist,
which the reader may either disregard or allow it to float
almost imperceptibly about the characters and events for
the sake of a picturesque effect. The narrative, it may be,
is woven of so humble a texture, as to require this
advantage and at the same time to render it the more
difficult of attainment.

These words may be taken as the modern announcement of Romance,
as distinguished from that of elder times.

The many romantic Novels written by Scott can be separated into
two groups, marked by a cleavage of time: the year being 1819,
the date of the publication of "Ivanhoe." In the earlier group,
containing the fiction which appeared during the five years from
1814 to 1819, we find world-welcomed masterpieces which are an
expression of the unforced first fruits of his genius: the three
series of "Tales of My Landlord," "Guy Mannering," "Rob Roy,"
"The Heart of Midlothian" and "Old Mortality," to mention the
most conspicuous. To the second division belong stories equally
well known, many of them impressive: "The Monastery,"
"Kenilworth," "Quentin Durward," and "Red Gauntlet" among them,
but as a whole marking a falling off of power as increasing
years and killing cares made what was at first hardly more than
a sportive effort, a burden under which a man, at last broken,
staggered toward the desired goal. There is no manlier, more
gallant spectacle offered in the annals of literature than this
of Walter Scott, silent partner in a publishing house and ruined
by its failure after he has set up country gentleman and
gratified his expensive taste for baronial life, as he buckles
to, and for weary years strives to pay off by the product of his
pen the obligations incurred; his executors were able to clear
his estate of debt. It was an immense drudgery (with all
allowance for its moments of creative joy) accomplished with
high spirits and a kind of French