suse of the
privileges of good fiction. To maintain a strong impression on the
reader, his touch is occasionally strong and fearless, like that of
Kipling. But this object attained, he uses his materials with an almost
unnecessary reticence. The episode of the cannibalism of Gabbett and his
fellow-convicts is exceptional. Yet it purposely falls short of the
terrible original, which is happily hidden away from general view
between the covers of an old Parliamentary report.

It has been said of Clarke, by one of his friends, that in his estimate
of motives he was invariably cynical. Though the assertion goes too far,
it seems to suggest the best explanation of his notable preference for
delineating the dark side of human nature. He appeared ever to see vice
more clearly, or at any rate to find it more interesting for the
purposes of fiction, than the good or the neutral in character. But his
cynicism--if it really formed a settled feature of his character--was
not of the kind that implies any indifference to injustice or
dishonesty. In this particular, both his fiction and essays have no
uncertain tone. It is indeed a fault of Clarke that his bad characters
are in most cases wholly bad. He makes Frere abandon a life of
debauchery under the influence of a pure woman's affection, but the
effect is afterwards destroyed by evidences that the attachment on the
man's side is sensual and based on vanity. Moreover, Frere the prison
tyrant and base denier of Dawes' heroism remains unexcused.

Bob Calverley and Miss Ffrench, the only important representatives of
the ordinary virtues in _Long Odds_, are little more than dim shadows
contrasted with the clearly-marked personalities of half a dozen others
in the story who are rogues, or the associates and instruments of
rogues. 'The human anguish of every page' of _His Natural Life_ which
Lord Rosebery found so compelling to his attention, need not have been
so continuous and unqualified.

The author seems purposely to have ignored the opportunity afforded by
the story for the introduction of a character who, while asserting the
claims of Rufus Dawes and the broader interests of humanity, need not
have defeated the main motive of the plot. It was a decided error not to
gratify in this way the combative instinct of the reader. The Rev. James
North--'gentleman, scholar, and Christian priest'--might have been an
active opponent of cruelty like Eden, the clergyman in _It's Never Too
Lat