arrative, and no
place in it. Their presence assuredly displays a knowledge of the time
and its chronicles, but they are just so many obstacles to the clear run
of the story, and no more. This is the chief fault to be found with
the book, but it is a grave fault, and the writer, if he is to take the
place which his powers and his industry alike join in claiming for him,
must learn to cast 'as rubbish to the void' many a painfully acquired
bit of knowledge. To be an antiquary is one thing, and to be an
antiquarian romancer is another. Dr. Doyle has aimed at being both one
and the other in the same pages. A true analogy may be taken from the
stage, where the supernumeraries are not allowed to obscure the leading
lady and gentleman at any moment of action.

Mr. Stanley Weyman, who is not Dr. Doyle's equal in other matters, is
in this sole respect his master. He keeps his hero on the scene, and his
action in full swing. He gives no indication of a profound or studious
knowledge of his time, but he knows it fairly well. Mr. Doyle's method
is at bottom the truer, when once the detailed labour is hidden, but
when it bares its own machinery it loses most of its gain. Mr. Weyman
tells a rattling story in rattling fashion. His is the good old style
of easy-going romance, where courage and adventure never fail. He has
chosen the realm of D'Artagnan and Aramis, of Porthos and Athos, and he
has plenty of vivacity, and can invent brilliantly on the lines on
which the brave Dumas invented long before him. He is a cheerful and
inspiriting echo. He cannot wind the mighty horn the elders sounded,
but he can imitate it fairly from a distance. It is only when that crass
reviewer comes along to tell us that the old original hunter of romance
is back again that his music gives us anything but pleasure. For my own
part, I hope he may flourish long, and give us stories as good as 'A
Gentleman of France' as often as he can. My 'Bravo!' shall be as
ready as any man's and as hearty. Why--to change the simile used just
now--when a man is resting his legs in a comfortable _auberge_, and
drinking the honest light wine of the country (which doesn't pretend to
be better than it is), should the asinine enthusiast come to spoil
his enjoyment by swearing that he sits in the enchanted palace of Sir
Walter, and has before him the mighty wine Sir Walter bottled? The
enthusiast provokes to wrath. It's a very good _duberge_--it's a
capital, comfortable house