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fewer biographies being written, more and more people seem to be
commemorated in stodgy volumes; and further, the selection could not be
made by authority, because the kind of lives that are wanted are not
the lives of dull important people, but the lives of interesting and
unimportant people who have given their vividness and originality to
life itself, to talk and letters and complex relationships; we do not
want the lives of people who have prosed on platforms and bawled at the
openings of bazaars. They have said their say, and we have heard as
much as we need to hear of their views already. But I know half-a-dozen
people, of whose words and works probably no record whatever will be
made, whose lives, if they could be painted, would be more interesting
than any novel, and more inspiring than any sermon; who have not taken
things for granted, but have made up their own minds; and, what is
more, have really had minds to make up; who have said, day after day,
fine, humorous, tender, illuminating things; who have loved life better
than routine, and ideas-better than success; who have really enriched
the blood of the world, instead of feebly adulterating it; who have
given their companions zest and joy, trenchant memories and eager
emotions: but the whole process has been so delicate, so evasive, so
informal, that it seems impossible to recapture the charm in heavy
words. A man who would set himself to write the life of one of these
delightful people, instead of adding to the interminable stream of
tiresome romances which inundate us, might leave a very fine legacy to
the world. It would mean an immense amount of trouble, and the
cultivation of a Boswellian memory--for such a book would consist
largely of recorded conversations--but what a hopeful and uplifting
thing it would be to read and re-read!

The difficulty is that to a perceptive man--and none but a man of the
finest perception could do it,--an eagle-eating eagle, in fact--it
would seem a ghoulish and a treacherous business. He would feel like an
interviewer and like a spy. It would have to be done in a noble,
self-denying sort of secrecy, amassing and recording day by day; and he
would never be able to let his hero suspect what was happening, or the
gracious spontaneity would vanish; for the essence of such a life and
such talk as I have described is that they should be wholly frank and
unconsidered; and the thought of the presence of the note-taking
spectato