ike George Eliot, makes no pretence to be an artist in
nomenclature. She merely aims, I imagine, at names which, without being
colourless, are free from meaning and in every way possible.

Thackeray is the outstanding instance of a novelist who makes a fine-art
of nomenclature. With him there is an obvious delight in coining names.
Thus there would be no harm in Clive Newcome going to Windsor and
Newton's shop to buy paint brushes, but Thackeray sends him to Messrs
Soap and Isaac--a parody of that highly respectable firm which always
pleases me.

I have with some little labour made a rough index of _Vanity Fair_, and I
find in the second volume (which is probably a fair sample of the names
in the whole book) that there are 247 names. The author evidently takes
a delight in their invention. For instance, at one of Becky's great
dinner parties (vol. ii., p. 172), the eminent guests who come in after
dinner are principally cheeses {16}--Duchess (Dowager) of Stilton, Duc de
la Gruyere, Marchioness of Cheshire, Marchese Alessandro Strachino, Comte
de la Brie, Baron Schapzuger. The list also contains the name of
Chevalier Tosti, who, I take it, is toasted cheese.

The titles he gives to business firms are not always complimentary. For
instance, we have (vol. ii., p. 283) the case of poor Mr Scape, who was
ruined by entering the great Calcutta house of Fogle, {17a} Fake and
Cracksman. Both Fogle and Fake had left the firm with large fortunes,
"and Sir Horace Fogle is about to be raised to the peerage as Baron
Bandanna."

A similar type of name is the title of Becky's solicitors, Messrs Burke,
Thurtell and Hayes, {17b} who forced the Insurance Company to pay the
amount for which poor Jos Sedley's life had been insured (vol. ii., p.
391). It is interesting to find (vol. ii., p. 341) that the author
introduces himself in the person of Mr Frederick Pigeon, who "lost eight
hundred pounds to Major Loder and the Honourable Mr Deuceace." This may
remind us of Thackeray's own loss of 1500 pounds in a similar way (_Dict.
of Nat. Biog._). In some instances the author evidently could not take
the trouble to coin effective names, as for instance in his reference to
the firm of Jones, Brown and Robinson {18} (vol. ii., p. 130). A member
of this firm became 1st Baron Helverlyn, when he altered his name to
Johnes. His unfortunate daughter became the wife of Lord Gaunt. The
subsidiary titles of this nobleman are pleasant--Visco