r forms of literature;
but to talk at all fruitfully of any branch of art, it is needful to
build our definitions on some more fundamental ground than binding. Why,
then, are we to add "in prose"? "The Odyssey" appears to me the best of
romances; "The Lady of the Lake" to stand high in the second order; and
Chaucer's tales and prologues to contain more of the matter and art of
the modern English novel than the whole treasury of Mr. Mudie. Whether a
narrative be written in blank verse or the Spenserian stanza, in the
long period of Gibbon or the chipped phrase of Charles Reade, the
principles of the art of narrative must be equally observed. The choice
of a noble and swelling style in prose affects the problem of narration
in the same way, if not to the same degree, as the choice of measured
verse; for both imply a closer synthesis of events, a higher key of
dialogue, and a more picked and stately strain of words. If you are to
refuse "Don Juan," it is hard to see why you should include "Zanoni" or
(to bracket works of very different value) "The Scarlet Letter"; and by
what discrimination are you to open your doors to "The Pilgrim's
Progress" and close them on "The Faery Queen"? To bring things closer
home, I will here propound to Mr. Besant a conundrum. A narrative called
"Paradise Lost" was written in English verse by one John Milton; what
was it then? It was next translated by Chateaubriand into French prose;
and what was it then? Lastly, the French translation was, by some
inspired compatriot of George Gilfillan (and of mine), turned bodily
into an English novel; and, in the name of clearness, what was it then?

But, once more, why should we add "fictitious"? The reason why is
obvious. The reason why not, if something more recondite, does not want
for weight. The art of narrative, in fact, is the same, whether it is
applied to the selection and illustration of a real series of events or
of an imaginary series. Boswell's "Life of Johnson" (a work of cunning
and inimitable art) owes its success to the same technical manoeuvres as
(let us say) "Tom Jones": the clear conception of certain characters of
man, the choice and presentation of certain incidents out of a great
number that offered, and the invention (yes, invention) and preservation
of a certain key in dialogue. In which these things are done with the
more art--in which the greater air of nature--readers will differently
judge. Boswell's is, indeed, a very specia