just as in "Modern Painters," Ruskin
takes Turner and lets him stand for one hundred, and all other artists
grade down from this.

Addison merely reflected the taste of his time. Shakespeare was not
thought any more of two hundred years ago than we think of him now, with
this difference--that he is the author we now talk about and seldom read,
but then they did not discuss him any more than we now go to see him
played.

An interesting character by the name of Jacob Tonson appears upon the
scene, as a friend of Addison in his early days. Tonson enjoyed the
distinction of being the father of the modern publishing business--the
first man to bring out the works of authors at his own risk and then sell
the product to bookstores. I believe it is Mr. Le Gallienne who has been
so unkind as to speak of "Barabbas Tonson." Among Tonson's many good
strokes was his act in buying the copyright of "Paradise Lost" from
Simmons, the bookseller, who had purchased all rights in the manuscript
from the bereaved widow on a payment of eight pounds.

Tonson appreciated good things in a literary way. He was on friendly terms
with all the principal writers, and did much in bringing some shy writers
to the front. Addison and Tonson laid great plans, few of which
materialized, and some were carried out by other people--notably the
compilation of an English Dictionary. In Sixteen Hundred Ninety-nine we
find Addison, in possession of a pension of three hundred pounds a year,
crossing the Channel into France with the object "to travel and qualify
himself to serve His Majesty."

The diplomatic language of the world was French. With intent to learn the
language, Addison made his home with a modest French family; and a better
way of acquiring a language than this has never been devised. A young
friend of mine, however, recently returned from Europe, tells me that the
ideal plan is to make love to a vivacious French girl who can not speak
English. Of the excellence of this plan I know nothing--it may be a mere
barren ideality.

A little over a year in France and we are told that "Addison spoke the
language like a native "--a glib expression, still able-bodied, that means
little or much. From France Addison followed down into Italy, and spent a
year there, residing in various small towns with the same object in view
that took him to France.

And one of his admirers relates that "he learned to speak Italian
perfectly, his pronunciation being marred