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have a name at all, it is Legion; for, profiting by the ignorance of the world at large as to his identity, many Editors present themselves simultaneously wherever there is an extraordinary council, concert, or culprit. No less than eight pseudo-Editors of the leading journal of Europe claimed entrance at the opening of the late Anti-Corn-Law Bazaar, reminding its conductors, as a poetical steward informed us, of the octagon avatar of Kehama, when he came to fight Yamen.

But in the provinces such things cannot occur. There, the Editor of the newspaper is a "great fact," not only recognised by the local constitution, but no unimportant part of it. With the exception of Mr. Pott, in" Pickwick," and his sturdy rival at Eatanswill, (laughable caricatures, and intended to be such,) we think that no specimen of the class has been presented to the world. As we have the happiness of numbering among our friends many of these gentlemen, we shall soon be set right, if the following sketch be ill drawn.

The Editor of the provincial newspaper (we speak, of course, of the respectable journals, which form an overwhelming majority,) is usually a highly educated man, who possesses the two press-essentialsa keen intellect and a ready pen. But these are not nearly sufficient to enable him to "hold his own." The retired chamber-scribe, who seldom comes in contact with the world, must have both, yet he would be strangely bewildered were he asked to undertake the editorship of a local paper. To these the Editor must add great energy and indomitable "pluck;" and yet another addition must be made-that of the tact without which all the rest will be wasted. If our readers think we are placing the standard somewhat high, we can assure him that there are scores who more than come up to it.

Look at the Country Editor's mere literary work, which forms but a small part of his duties. Every day of his life he reads every line of every London daily paper. But that you have seen men do, day after day, at the club, and the "place in Albemarle-street." True-but they take a morning to do it. Can they do it in a couple of hours, pen and scissors alternately in hand, snipping at every scrap of information likely to interest a country reader-compressing a lengthened story into a twentieth part of its length-and explaining, by the addition of notes, what is too curt or too pert for any but the sharpened apprehension of a cockney-placing conflicting statements in contrast, and extracting therefrom a "pill" for the political opponent, according to the party our friend advocates? That's what a Country Editor calls reading the London papers; a different process from drawling over the various criticisms on "the great maestro" and the little "realist."

sense.

That is done, and the printers are at work. The post! One, two, three, four-nine letters in all. Only nine! We're lucky to-day. The first is from our regular "London Correspondent:" he's angry about some typographical blunders, which made his last article nonWhy don't he write plainer, then? But what is his batch of news? The Queen-the Opera-the Duke's Banquet-Sham Fight at Portsmouth-Prince George. That seems all right. So that goes to the printer's, too. And now for our local letters. The "Curate of Pewington" on Arianism. His letter contains eleven sides, and a volume of his sermons is referred to for extract. He must be answered privately. And in five minutes he is answered privately. “ A Farming Subscriber," abusing the ministry. No-that's no farmer's writing-an Editor's not to be caught! Some idle lawyer's clerk.

We'll answer him in the "Notices to Correspondents," and tell him he's a humbug. "A Tyro," sends a mathematical problem for "some ingenious correspondent to solve," We'll give him one in return, touching the thickness of his own head. Here's a stiff hand! Action for libel threatened "unless we insert an apology and pay the costs— viz., five shillings for this letter." Where's the file? What did we say? That "Mr. Samuel Clod's objection to the patent plough was a piece of ignorant bigotry." Why, like Sullen in the "Beaux' Stratagem," the man don't appreciate common civility. This week we'll give him a harder rap. "The Marquis of ***** would like to see us." And we should like to see the Marquis; so we'll ring, order the horse, and ride over.-And our friend does ride over to the nobleman's seat, and obtains some confidential information about a probable vacancy in the representation; and then he rides round to know why the lawyer in the next town has not sent him a long advertisement of some estates he is going to sell. And then he calls upon three or four gentlemen interested in promoting or opposing the new railway line, and they compliment him on the able article of Saturday last, and hope he'll continue to "work those fellows." And then he rides home; but finding the cloth is not actually laid, he writes an article upon the best mode of providing for the destitute Irish, and washes his hands for dinner.

And at dinner he sits thoughtful, moody; tired with what he has done, and bored by the thought of what he has yet to do. Does he? Is he? His pretty wife opposite, after appealing to him with bright tears in her brighter eyes, not to make her ill with laughing at his imitation of old Grogblossom, the churchwarden, speaking in vestry against Puseyism, insists upon telling him a score of stories which she has heard in her round of calls. He hears them all with the liveliest interest; pronounces, in his good-humoured, off-hand way upon the parties named; finishes his port, or, more probably, his punch; and tells her, that if she really means to see Charles Kean, who is "starring it" in the town, the sooner her bonnet is on, the better. The theatre, and perhaps a little supper party, and-it's one o'clock, everybody is gone, and won't he go to bed? His pretty wife may go; he'll be after her as soon as he has written three or four letters for the early morning post.

But it is at election time that the Country Editor comes out in full force. Then he is indeed somebody. Not that he can work harder than at other times; for never are the "crowded hours" better exemplified than in the constant life of an Editor. But who writes the candidate's bold yet guarded address to the electors-the dashing document that says so much and means so little? Who backs it up by highly-spiced articles in the paper, calling upon the constituency to judge between the manly appeal before them, and the hesitating, Jesuitical composition with which the other side insults their understanding? Who frames the spirited placards, signed, "An Elector to his Brethren," "A Hater of Humbug," " A Rate-payer," and the like, which, in all the colours of the rainbow, enliven the walls of the town? Who gives the candidate hints for his speech, and takes care that his proposer shall not make more blunders than can be helped, and that his seconder shall seem to speak to the point? Who dispatches a flaming account of the election to the London organs of the same political party? Who suggests the new toasts for the chairing

dinner, and frames half the speeches, and reports them all? Who, if his man wins, sounds the note of exultation; and, who, if beaten, threatens, nay concocts, the petition against the return? These and a hundred other things, without which the " county could not be kept together," are done by the editor of the county paper.

Generally speaking, he is a thoroughly happy man; for though his energies are almost over-taxed, their result is appreciated. He is looked up to as not merely an arbiter elegantiarum, but as a tribunal to which most questions may be safely referred. The neighbouring aristocracy are but too glad to be upon the best of terms with him; for he is not only a fast friend and a formidable enemy, but a man of address, information, spirit and principle-in short, a gentleman. And that he is so esteemed may be gathered from a little speech, addressed by a well-meaning though somewhat didactic person, to a fair and valued friend of ours, whose husband had lately become editor of the-never mind what-Journal and Messenger:-" My love, you are now an Editor's wife; but remember, it is to him, and not to yourself, that you owe the attention you will receive. Don't let your head be turned by your position.”

WHITEHALL.*

AFTER discussions in literary coteries of that vexata quæstio, the authorship of " Whitefriars," we have frequently heard it wondered why so brilliant a success was not followed up with the rapidity to be expected, in this age of steam writing, as well as of steam everything else-more especially as the chief fault which we critics were (for a wonder) unanimous in finding in " Whitefriars," was, its too great profusion of invention, its prodigality of power, which seemed as if wantonly multiplying difficulties, merely for the pleasure of overcoming them as a strong swimmer rejoices in buffeting against the current of the waves, and the young wrestle and conflict with one another, excited only by the pleasure which the strenuous development of physical energy affords to them. One of these topics of literary chitchat, the votaries of the Chinese nymph are now deprived of: we have before us a new work from that hand which seemed to become a master's without serving an apprenticeship, in the noble historical romance of "Whitehall." We use the word advisedly-noble. As to the real parentage of these works, we confess ourselves as unable as our compeers to throw light on the subject; or if, from such inklings as have reached us, we might be able to form conjectures nearer the mark than those of our contemporaries, we imagine that the author would owe us few thanks for elucidating the matter, while to the public in general may be applied the witty reproof of the Hebrew boy to the Athenian, who asked him what he carried so carefully concealed-" If my mother had wished it to be known, she would not have covered it."

We do not know that we can give a more favourable opinion of "Whitehall" than to say-which we conscientiously can-that the readers of "Whitefriars" will not be disappointed in it, high as their expectations will be raised. The stream which burst forth with such

* Whitehall, an Historical Romance of the Days of Charles the First. By the Author of " Whitefriars."

freshness and vigour in the arid sands of modern fiction has lost nothing of its force-or violence, if the word pleases better-and has certainly gained in the splendour and variety of the jets which it forms. There is beauty mingling amidst all the tumult, and uproar, and whirl of that tremendous catastrophe which is the historical basis of this grand tale—it is a cataract on which a rainbow plays. In vain, it seems, did we learned critics demonstrate to this torrent writer that he ought to meander softly, and put us to sleep according to authentic canons. Those excellent counsels, frequently enforced with the acerbity with which, like copper-plate engravers, we make our impressions, seem to have been all thrown away. The author of "Whitefriars" is of that rare class who make canons, but who do not receive them. Whoever steps into his magic chariot must rush along with him, and see strange sights, and hear strange sounds, and marvel, and sometimes condemn; but he will never yawn, and, in our opinion, heterodox as it may be, that canon of criticism is the most valid which says

"Tout genre est bon, hors le genre ennuyeux."

To some readers, indeed, who are in love, or have been so long accustomed to it that they imagine they are in love, with the purling stream order of fiction, this perpetual activity, these continual, rushing accessions to the main-stream of the narrative, may be rather confounding, as it is to the inhabitant of a lowland country when he first traverses a mountainous tract still in the disorder and grandeur of primeval creation. For our parts, we enjoy this exuberance of life, this generous wealth of intellect; and it is only the singular velocity of narrative, which leaves nothing untouched, and touches all things with light, that enables us to get through the immense business of these volumes. There is no confusion, no heaping of ideas in the memory after the perusal-each part stands out in the recollection as clear and full as if it had been the whole-and yet there is more matter in the romance than would serve our literary Vauxhall sandwich-cutters with stuff for half a dozen.

Looking back, and remembering with what vitality and individuality the innumerable personages of the romance remain in our perception, we can scarcely divine by what cunning trick of art it is effected. We live through six years the most important in English history; we contemplate the society of the period under almost all its aspects; we attend the courts of kings; we debate with statesmen, plot with conspirators, trace through all their progress, even from a bubbling spring to a tremendous cataract, the times of the unfortunate Charles the First. How all this is effected in so short a compass, we scarcely know; whether it is by a happy power of touching the chords of association which the writer possesses, and by which we become, as it were, our own romancers, and fill up those vast sketches with the colours supplied by memory; or whether, in reality, the pictures are made out to us as perfectly as we conceive them, we will not pause to analyse; but the effect is in a high degree vivid, striking, and rapid. We have never any time to get tired of our company; numerous as the characters are, every one presents himself so distinctly, so full of object, purpose, and business, that after we have seen with what intent he is introduced, we cannot imagine how we could have done without him, though at times we might wonder, when he presented himself, what the author could find for him to do. In the perfectly

preserved consistency and idiosyncracy of these innumerable personages, the author exerts a power which we scarcely exaggerate in bestowing upon it the epithet of Shaksperian.

As in "Whitefriars," but essentially different in all the main characteristics, the hero is the connecting link of the events and personages of the romance, as, indeed, is the case in all the writings of almost all great romancers, from Apuleius down to Scott. In fact, it is through his eyes that we witness the vast drama; with him, or by him, we are present at festivals and direful tragedies; by his means we behold the dying glories of the exiled court of Charles the First at Oxford; compose brilliant masques to gratify a coquettish queen; dine with the citizens; chat with handsome Mistress Chaloner; mingle in the wit, beauty, and splendour of Northumberland House, presided over by the beautiful Carlisle; listen to Waller's impromptus, (and the author imitates his style so perfectly, that we actually looked in Waller's poems for the one imputed to him, and found it not;) share in the horror and din of battles; tread with caution through deserted palaces; penetrate recesses where we own we dared not go alone; stand beside Charles on the deck of the vessel which bore him to desolate Hurst; witness the intrigues which caused or accompanied the great catastrophe; acquiesce in bold theories which explain some of the mysteries of history; consult with regicides, plot with royalists; we are in all men's business and bosoms; we go to conventicles and watch the moods and listen to the ravings of fanaticism. Nothing is too high or too low for us; even the dark workings of the brain of madness we penetrate; and sometimes, amidst the uproar, we light on scenes of a beauty and tranquillity as exquisite as the blue sunshine gleaming out through a tempest-racked sky.

While thus strongly excited, it is also a satisfaction to feel that our sympathies are not wasted; this historical romance keeps its word; it is historical on all essential points; the language, above all, is perfectly that of the seventeenth century, probably arising from the author's evident familiarity with the writers of that great age-those "wells of English undefiled." Phrases at which we felt frequently inclined to cavil, we have found, in several cases, to be preserved among historical memoranda, in time to save our critical acumen from the scoffs of those wiseacres who do not know how difficult it is, when we have such an artist on the stage, to tell when the real animal squeaks, and when he himself imitates its tones. If we were censoriously disposed, we might, indeed, object, that, in some instances, this confidence in nature has made the author neglect some accessories which art might have furnished. But we will not insist too much on our opinion, for it is a fact, whether discreditable or not to the art critical, that "Whitefriars" became popular for those very qualities which some of us unsparingly denounced. In passing, however, we would observe, that powerful, tragical almost to horror, as is the effect produced by the singular knot with which the writer has contrived to unite the fortunes of his hero with those of the king and his mighty antagonist, in a work which takes so strong a hold of the imagination, the author has perhaps a little exceeded the privileges of the romancer in mingling historical personages in so sad and terrible a legend as that of "Stonehenge," although it probably does not exceed the verities of the age, and is supported by a tradition which, however, like most

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