ther of Uncle Toby and
Trim, would I say a word in disrespect. But I am thankful to live in
times when men no longer have the temptation to write so as to call
blushes on women's cheeks, and would shame to whisper wicked allusions
to honest boys. Then, above all, we had WALTER SCOTT, the kindly, the
generous, the pure--the companion of what countless delightful hours;
the purveyor of how much happiness; the friend whom we recall as the
constant benefactor of our youth! How well I remember the type and the
brownish paper of the old duodecimo "Tales of my Landlord!" I have
never dared to read the "Pirate," and the "Bride of Lammermoor," or
"Kenilworth," from that day to this, because the finale is unhappy, and
people die, and are murdered at the end. But "Ivanhoe," and "Quentin
Durward!" Oh! for a half-holiday, and a quiet corner, and one of those
books again! Those books, and perhaps those eyes with which we read
them; and, it may be, the brains behind the eyes! It may be the tart
was good; but how fresh the appetite was! If the gods would give me the
desire of my heart, I should be able to write a story which boys would
relish for the next few dozen of centuries. The boy-critic loves the
story: grown up, he loves the author who wrote the story. Hence the
kindly tie is established between writer and reader, and lasts pretty
nearly for life. I meet people now who don't care for Walter Scott, or
the "Arabian Nights;" I am sorry for them, unless they in their time
have found THEIR romancer--their charming Scheherazade. By the way,
Walter, when you are writing, tell me who is the favorite novelist in
the fourth form now? have you got anything so good and kindly as
dear Miss Edgeworth's Frank? It used to belong to a fellow's sisters
generally; but though he pretended to despise it, and said, "Oh, stuff
for girls!" he read it; and I think there were one or two passages which
would try my eyes now, were I to meet with the little book.

As for Thomas and Jeremiah (it is only my witty way of calling Tom and
Jerry), I went to the British Museum the other day on purpose to get it;
but somehow, if you will press the question so closely, on reperusal,
Tom and Jerry is not so brilliant as I had supposed it to be. The
pictures are just as fine as ever; and I shook hands with broad-backed
Jerry Hawthorn and Corinthian Tom with delight, after many years'
absence. But the style of the writing, I own, was not pleasing to me;
I even thought