he would turn the matter over in his mind, with a view to the production of some brief and humorous tale, if only by way of experiment. There were several gentlemen of our acquaintance whom Mr. Crayon was accustomed to take off,' and that with so much force and vividness as to constitute them about the best portraits in his répertoire. One was Mr. Golfer, a tall, well-built gentleman, with dark whiskers and mustache, a spiritual forehead, and something of a military air. Golfer was extensively read in the poets, and had undoubtedly a fine, though fastidious and severe taste. Out of doors he wore that disreputable form of hat familiarly known as the 'wideawake,' and his custom was to walk along the streets haughtily and dreamily, as if with his head towering in other worlds. This majestic, cynical individual, with his handsome Roman nose, and dreamy suspicious eyes, never seemed entirely comfortable except when discussing, usually in emphatic monosyllables, some doubtful point of poetical taste, with the aid of a long pipe and a glass of bitter beer. He scarcely ever smiled, and never laughed. If any one perpetrated a pun in his hearing, a cloud of rebuke would settle on his brow, and he would draw himself slowly up with an expression of ineffable disgust. If, however, the said pun happened to be conspicuously destitute of wit, he would perhaps smile a little, but with a grim expression, as if to indicate that he was ashamed of the slight weakness into which he had been betrayed. 6 Whenever he said anything smart, which was, in fact, always, his laugh followed instantly, like a guffaw transmitted through a speaking trumpet. He would then look his victim straight in the face, with a keen, vehement, and irresistible Eh? eh?' in order to compel a cacchinatory tribute to his wit. This was awful to goodnatured people, who found their features hardening into a fixed grin. After a night with Mr. Bowler, I have been fain to breakfast in bed, and enjoy a forenoon's rest. I have even felt as if I could luxuriate in quiet dreams for a week. Then there was Mr. Mallet, a gentleman of pleasing Scandinavian complexion, but with a beard of flaming vermillion, of which he was perversely proud. Yet no wonder he clung to his beard, for was not every hair of it gold? His emper was as fiery as his chin, having a personal dignity to support which often caused him to stand angrily on the defensive. Between him and Mr. Bowler there existed a perpetual feud, which Mr. Bankier, reasoning from abstract principles, considered un- | philosophic, but which Mr. Golfer, little given to speech, and for the most part a mere spectator of what was going on, pronounced to be 'decidedly amusing.' Only one more character remains to be noted, that of my dear particular friend, Mr. J. B. Buckingham. This gentleman was slightly en bon point, bald-headed, and with a dark eye glowing like a coal, which the phrenologists described as indicating language large.' His vivid geniality, immense relish for enjoyment, and bright nimble faculties rendered him a kind of pivet, around which all the others revolved. His forte, how ever, was oratory of the loftiest kind. His was no slipshod Parliamentary style. Had opportunity afforded, he would have shaken the senate. Yet, when pouring forth his fervid and sublime sentences, the sneering cynic Golfer would listen with a look of haughty disdain Golfer, of all men, professing to despise sentiment!Golfer, notorious as a stealthy concoctor of plaintive little ditties, like a youth who had been crossed in love! Another of the set was Mr. John Anderson Bankier, a large man with a soft voice and a philosophic turn of mind. His head, which was thickly covered with hair prematurely whitened, was one of the hugest ever mounted on Caucasian shoulders. Within his capacious brain there were gropings of power, large and imperfectly exercised, yet evermore dim and vague, like the gropings of the blind Cyclops. Mr. Bankier had a habit of forcing down all discussion to a basis of first principles. When the argument waxed loud, he seldom | failed to command attention, not so much by his mas sive presence as by soft persuasive waves of the hand, and some such gentle appeal as-'Hear me for my cause!-gentlemen, hear me for my cause!' It was only, however, when the hours warmed and brightened into a glow of conviviality that Mr. Bankier exhibited his finer characteristics. Then it was that his friends discovered the full and complete amiability of his disposition. At such times he became even affectionate-chuckle, and Bowler guffaw, and Buckingham and Mallet grasping, in a friendly way, the hand of any one near him and crooning forth, in low, soft tones, like some veteran minstrel mellow with the inspiration of time, certain homely ditties expressive of the more tender and poetic emotions of the soul. The third of Mr. Crayon's originals was Mr. Bowler, a square-built, high-spirited gentleman, very bald, and with whiskers and beard originally black, but now slightly grizzled. Mr. Bowler had a voice like a cannon. In the most uproarious company his laugh drowned all other noises. His belief seemed to be that the use of speech was to stimulate the risible faculties. Every time he opened his lips it was to thunder forth a joke. Mr. Crayon had made an almost life-long study of this strange medley of persons, and the result was 25 elaborateness and perfection of portraiture which commanded universal approbation. His anecdotes regarding them were inexhaustable. With what intense relish did the silent and cynical Mr. Golfer listen to his comical delineations of Mr. J. A. Bankier, Mr. Bowler, Mr. Mallet, and Mr. Buckingham! Then, how did Bankier scream with enjoyment, as Golfer was exhibited with his secret convivial heart and lofty morose exterior! But, indeed, they each manifested a thorough apprecia tion and enjoyment of Crayon's delightful caricatures of all the rest. Crayon would not have hurt the feeling of any one of them for the world. The brilliant artist and myself had many a long taik as to how the five notabilities in question could be best | thrown together in a consecutive and well-constructed plot. To both of us they seemed to be a set of wellmarked and boldly-contrasted characters, and therefore admirably adapted for the purposes of fiction. True, Mr. Crayon continued to exhibit many qualms of con science. He did not like the idea of any writer holding up his particular friends to ridicule. The more, however, he wavered, the more I encouraged him to proceed. 'Why should not the litterateur,' I exclaimed, 'draw from the life, as well as the artist? And where is he to find life-models, unless among those about him and within the range of his study? Rely on it that creation of character means only observation of character. Frankenstein thought to create an entirely new man, and he only succeeded in making a monster.' This reasoning had its effect; and Mr. Crayon, confirmed in his intention of writing an original tale, wrought at his task with a commendable degree of diligence. At first he proposed to introduce myself as one of his dramatis personce, but to this I would not consent. 'No, no,' said I, 'there are no peculiarities about me; if I were really a character I would submit at once.' He tried to assure me that I would shine as the hero of a story, 'just as much as Golfer, or Bankier, or Bowler, or Mallet, or Buckingham.' Seeing, however, that I was seriously alarmed, he very prudently desisted. CHAPTER II. Artists are notoriously unpunctual. They work by fits and starts. As usually happens with men of lively imagination, they are not always in the mood. Even when most determined they are sometimes helpless. I have seen them waiting for an inflow of inspiration like mariners waiting for a tide. Mr. Crayon had, besides, a multitude of engagements both professional and social. He had kept lively on the canvas the family pride and affection of more than one generation. To him many of the existing race of juveniles were indebted for whatever knowledge they possessed of their grandfathers and grandmothers. Filial, conjugal, and parental memories were extensively kept dewy and bright through his agency. By virtue of his art, innumerable walls glowed with a life-an immortalness beyond that of the living men and women who daily looked on them with admiration and love. He had still many faces to preserve, so to speak, for posterity-many new links to establish between the age that was passing and the age that was to come. But the demands on the genial qualities of the man were even more engrossing than the demands on the exquisite skill of the artist. He was bombarded with dinners. For him the most accomplished cooks were daily perspiring; for him the most fastidious wine-merchants were daily producing their choicest vintages. His company was widely courted for the graces of heart, soul, and intellect which it was calculated to throw over the unspiritual materialities of wealth. Yet he made good use of his leisure. The story which he had planned grew to considerable bulk in his imagination. In writing it out, too, he made surprising progress. When completed, the result was such as to justify my anticipations. It was plain to me that I had not misjudged the peculiar bent of his genius. He had, in fact, produced a work abounding in racy descriptions of character, imbued with the keenest wit, and pointing the most appropriate moral. It would be gross and ridiculous affectation in me to pretend that I was not proud. That he was indebted to me for setting him on the right track he confessed. Had he set about inventing characters, they would, in all likelihood, have been monstrosities. They might have had no flesh and blood in them. But he had gone to nature-to the unerring fountains-to the eternal well-heads of truth. His descriptions had the veracity of photographs. There was nothing forced. Every touch was in harmony with every other touch. Some of the traits represented might be singular, but none of them were grotesque. Golfer, Bankier, and the rest, might be different from anything hitherto known, but only as newly-discovered plants might be different from those familiar to the botanist. In themselves they were clearly nature's handiwork, not something of man's device. Their vraisemblence was charming. I anticipated an extraordinary measure of success. Not only had I put Mr. Crayon on the right track, looking at the matter in the abstract, but I had put him on that track with which he was most familiar, which was in fact his specialty, and on which his experience was prodigious. Hence the astonishing ease with which he accomplished his purpose. It was like Blondin on the tight-rope, or Leotard on the trapeze. He was like the man who had devoted a lifetime to drawing profiles of the late Duke of Wellington, and who could hit off, with pen or pencil, the well-known features of the Duke as easily as he could sign his name. Crayon had been describing, delineating, in fact impersonating the originals of his story for years. He was as much at home on them as the great Paganini was at home on his fiddle. The consequence was a certain easy mastery-a completeness of finish combined with an absence of elaboration-which materially heightened the effect. Several of the scenes were superb. Among these was a quarrel between Mallet and Bankier, on the subject of art. The former was made to quote Ruskin dogmatically; while the latter was represented as not to be put down, but as motioning with his hand softly and deprecatingly, and exclaiming, in the blandest voice- My dear sir! You don't understand Ruskin. I pity you. Ruskin is not for shallow and ignorant people to quote. You should begin with some simpler author.' Heavens! this to a man who had made art the study of his life! The flame of his beard burned upward until his very forehead was on fire! Bowler laughed like a cavern; while Mallet hurled defiance all round. In the midst of the melée, Golfer was made to smile sardonically. Golfer enjoyed a public execution. He also delighted, in his dignified way, in seeing a friend scarified. Another good passage was one in which Buckingham was called upon to make a speech. His fervour, his intensity, his free and appropriate gesticulation, his vast range of imagination, his brilliant snatches of poetical quotation-all were reproduced, with their inevitable cheers, and with Golfer sublimely sneering, in a style worthy of Smollett, or Fielding, or Addison, or Goldsmith, or any of our best fictionists. The grand figure in the picture-that which gave it its individuality and humour-was still, of course, Golfer. So clever, indeed, was the plot, so quietly and finely were all the characters developed, and so full of hilarious humour were some of the incidents, that I had really nothing to suggest. All I had to do was simply to congratulate Mr. Crayon, and hurry the precious manuscript into the hands of the printer. But, at the eleventh hour, a difficulty arose which I had not anticipated. Crayon himself became alarmed at the idea of publication. His original delicate scruples revived in all their intensity. Every one of the characters would, he felt assured, be recognised at once, in spite of the false names assumed. He dreaded lest his conduct in the matter should be pronounced 'too bad.' In vain I tried to convince him of the contrary. They were all, I argued, men of sense, and would no more object to filling up the figures in a story, than they would object to filling up the figures in a historical picture. What!' I exclaimed, 'do you mean to tell me that Bankier would object, if you asked him to sit to you for an ancient philosopher? Or that Golfer would hesitate for a moment to stand the fact is, you must either cut out Bowler, or allow Bowler to cut out everybody else. Ha, ha, ha-ch?eh? Mallet was pleased with the story in the main, and thought most of the characters first-rate; 'but as for Mallet,' he said, 'it is neither more nor less than a piece of stupid impertinence; and I would recommend the writer to be very careful what he did. I like a joke as well as any man, but I must be laughed with not al.' Buckingham chuckled immensely, particularly at Golfer; but, for goodness sake!' he exclaimed, you must leave Buckingham out of the group.' In short, greatly to my annoyance, Mr. Crayon de cided not to publish. I urged, however, that the tale was too good to be thrown aside, and that if he would only disguise the characters a little the whole difficulty might be got over. The artist became thoughtful for a moment. He at length said-Your suggestion is a good one, and I shall see in a day or two what can be done.' CHAPTER III. The more I reflected on what had occurred, the more I became convinced that people were unnecessarily thin-skinned. Why should any one be eager to put on a cap merely because it happened to fit? I began to wonder how Shakspere came by his characters, and whether he lived at perpetual feud with his neighbours whose characters he had pilfered. Or, did he manage to disguise them so as to render them unrecognisable, yet without destroying their inherent truthfulness? Did he, for example, take a hot-headed cheesemonger Cheapside, who had captivated an alderman's daughter by telling her bouncing stories of how he had floored his rivals in the cheese-trade, and whose married career had terminated in jealousy, murder, and suicide? Did he, I say, take some such veritable personage-blacken his face so that his own mother would not have known him--call him by the strange name of Othello-and of to you for a Life Guardsman? Or that Mallet would have the slightest scruple in donning a broad-brimmed drab hat, and acting as your model for an unshaven Christian Israelite? Or that, if you desired to represent a modern Wamba, with sword of lath, scattering his jokes on all sides, Bowler would not submit to be your man? Or that Buckingham would not feel honoured to appear as the principal figure on the hustings in any Frithian picture of a popular election? How absurd, then, to suppose that they would give themselves up to painting, yet deny themselves to literature! Most men wish to be of some use in the world; and why should they be an exception? The fact is,' I concluded, that if novel-writing is permissible at all, the novelist must, like the painter, have a free run of society and the world.' All, however, would not do. Crayon still shook his head. His apprehensions were instinctive and insur-pass him off as a soldier under the Venetians? Or did mountable. He, accordingly, determined to read the story over to each of the party in turn, ostensibly in the way of consulting their judgment, but in reality for the purpose of ascertaining whether they would take offence on discovering their own likeness. The result was a squelcher to the whole affair. Golfer thought the characters of Bankier, Bowler, Mallet, and Buckingham delightfully drawn. He must say, however, that he considered Golfer an odious caricature. The 'fine Roman nose of him' he especially deprecated as an exaggeration. Bankier, on the other hand, pronounced Golfer a masterpiece. But, patting the air blandly, he declared Bankier to be a truly pitiful failure. Bowler shook the neighbourhood with his laughter at the humorous portraits of Bankier and Golfer; he called them 'famous;' but Bowler, he exclaimed, 'would not do at all. To do him justice he should have had all the talking to himself. Ha, ha! A story to be worth reading should have dialogue, and how can you have dialogue with a character that allows nobody else to speak?-eh?- eh? Well, allow me to speak,' remonstrated Crayon. No, no; he go more fearlessly to work, and incur the wrath of some grave prototype of Dogberry, by incontinently writing him down an ass? How Shakspere did I know not; but I could not avoid thinking that, after Mr. Crayon's experiment, a modern fictionist trode upon dangerous ground the moment he attempted to make use of his friends in the way of literary portraiture. Yet, unless models are selected from those really known to the writer, successful fiction would appear to be unattainable. A mighty genius like Shakspere might no doubt take merely a broad basis of natural qualities, develope them in other circumstances, and present them under phases alike yet different. With any one else, however, such disguises could never be complete without utter confusion and defacement of those qualities which gave truth and naturalness to the picture. For instance, had any one but Shakspere attempted to manufacture a Venetian Othello out of a Cheapside cheesemonger, the smell of the Stilton and the Chesshire would probably have clung to him through all his wars against the Ottoman. The littleness of the petty trafficker would have destroyed the sable majesty of the hero. It would still have been the soul of a Cockney cheesemonger in the gaudy trappings of a Moorish chief. However, I determined not to make up my mind on this point until I had seen how far so able a man as Crayon might prove successful in his attempt. Two or three weeks elapsed, and still there was no appearance of the new story in its altered and inoffensive shape. At length, however, the artist came to me with a thin roll of manuscript, and assured me, with more confidence than I had hitherto observed him assume, that he had succeeded far beyond his expectations. I was naturally enough delighted, the plan of alteration having been a suggestion of my own; and pressing him into an easy chair, I ordered the wherewithal to make us both comfortable, prior to the reading being commenced. These preliminaries over, Mr. Crayon opened the first chapter with his usual gravity. The descriptions were minute, and characterised by occasional touches of exquisite observation. Here and there I discovered some distinct feature of our friends, but this was usually followed by something calculated to throw the most suspicious off the scent. I listened with keen attention, and got interested. By degrees, however, it began to dawn upon me that the new version of the story was nothing more than an elaborate practical joke. The first thing that awakened my suspicion occurred in the course of a philosophical argument. 'But before going farther,' Mr. Bankier was made to say, in a persuasive tone, and with a soft wave of the hand, 'let us first settle the question, what is the end and aim of all existence?' This was, of course, a natural and characteristic touch. But what was my surprise to find the same gentleman represented shortly afterwards as stroking his flaming beard, joking in a voice screwed up to the pitch of a cotton-mill or a boilermaker's yard, and ha-ha-ing as nobody ever heard the gentle Bankier haha in this world. I then became suspicious and watchful, | when, in due time, I discovered that Mr. Crayon had produced his disguises by sticking the beard of Mallet on the wrong chin, transferring Bowler's voice to somebody else, fastening the fine Roman nose of Golfer on a totally erroneous countenance, and producing other mixtures and confusions such as were never before witnessed in life. The result, I must say, was exceed ingly droll to one acquainted with the parties. Mr. Crayon had, in fact, produced a burlesque—an extravaganza-taken from life, yet as unlike life as possiblelike one of those toy sets of figures, cut into sections, and capable of numerous transmogrifications, none of them being good copies from Nature, but merely bizarre combinations of impossible occurrence in the flesh. We had, of course, a good laugh over the affair, but the more we thought of the fastidiousness of Golfer, Bankier, Bowler, Mallet, and Buckingham, the more we became convinced of its unreasonableness. We set them all five down as the stupidly sensitive enemies of the just rights and privileges of authorship. Why should Bowler make such use of his stentorian voice if he is ashamed of it? Will Mallet pretend for a moment that he is not proud of the beard which Crayon designed to make famous? If Bankier is at all sincere in desiring to be heard for his cause, wherefore should he shrink from the glory of a wider audience? Does Golfer mean to contend that his beautiful gift of nose is a possession to be modestly concealed? On what principle of common sense should the splendid oratory of Buckingham 'go no farther?' I tell these gentlemen that they have lost a chance of that immortality for which thousands are content to toil and die. But their feeling is, I admit, a common one. Most people shrink from publicity, unless under lights so absurdly flattering as to be, in fact, glaringly false. There are few who care, like Cromwell, to be painted as they are, with all their seams and warts. No one, indeed, knows better than Crayon that, in the eyes of a sitter, it is only when the expression is pleasing that the likeness is held to be correct. The hesitation of authors to make a free use of their friends as models, is probably at the foundation of much that is preposterous in current fiction. Our ablest writers exhibit a constant tendency to depart from nature. They are afraid to be personal. All around them, their keen eyes detect characters that would shine in their pages. But these they labour to avoid. They are thus engaged in a continual effort to get away from what is natural and true. Hence exaggerations, monstrosities, unrealisable caricatures of humanity. Hence a perpetual borrowing-not from men, but from books. Yet I can hardly blame the poor authors. Whenever they hold the mirror up to nature, some one is sure to recognise his own likeness, and start up with an angry-' How dare you?'-'gross breach of friendship!' or 'abominable impertinence!' There is therefore nothing left for them but to exhibit men and women as alien as possible to anything that has ever existed, or can possibly exist, in nature. In conclusion, I can only regret the existence of a weakness to which I thought the lofty cynicism of Golfer, the bland good nature and profound philosophy of Bankier, the defiant, bantering spirit of Bowler, the fierce resentful pride of Mallet, and the large-hearted bonhomie of Buckingham would have rendered them superior. I hope, however, they will profit by this narrative; and that, in particular, I shall not lose so valued a friend as Mr. Crayon by this hasty, and it may be courageous, attempt at drawing from the life. SICKNESS AND HEALTH. SEE how the brown leaves lie, mamma; Hark how the sad winds sigh, mamma, I love so well to play, mamma, Where the clustering harebells hide. J. P. H. |