In 1829 Colburn published “Frank Mildmay,” a novel full of false morality and falser style, but delineating sea life with such a flavour of fun and frolic, adventures and brine, that Marryat was at once hailed as a true successor to Smollett. This was followed by a rapid succession of sea stories, among the best of which undoubtedly are “Peter Simple” and “Midshipman Easy.” The perusal of these works has probably done more to turn youthful aspiration and energies to the choice of a profession than any series of formal injunctions ever penned. Old King William, the Sailor-King, was so entranced with “Peter Simple” that he begged to be introduced to the author, and promised to bestow some honourable distinction upon him for his services; but afterwards recollecting suddenly that he “had written a book against the impressment of seamen,” he refused to fulfil his pledge. When, later on, Colburn published Marryat’s “Diary in America,” the Yankees felt terribly outraged, and the severe criticism that followed speedily emptied his shelves of a large edition. This was emphatically the period of fashionable novels, and the great outside world was perpetually calling out for more and more romantic accounts of that attractive region to which middle-class thought could only aspire in reverent fancy. And though these novels seemed written primarily to illustrate the moral lesson of Touchstone to the Shepherd--“Shepherd, wert thou ever at court?” “No.” “Then thou art damned”--the public received the oracle, not only with humility, but thankfulness. For a time Mr. Bulwer Lytton was a disciple of this fashionable school, but even “Pelham” has an interest greater than any other specimen of its class, for though, in some degree, an illustration of the maxim that “manners make the man,” the threads of a darker and more tragic interest are interwoven with the tale. As an artistic worker, as a true delineator of our subtler and deeper passions, Lord Lytton was far above any other of Colburn’s writers--above, indeed, any other writer of the day; while his sophistry, immense as it undoubtedly is, only lends a more forcible and enthralling interest to his plots. None of Colburn’s novelists--and their name was legion--brought in more grist to the publishing mill than Lord Lytton; and, when the meal had been baked several times, Messrs. Routledge paid the author £20,000 for all future use of these works--as popular now perhaps in their cheap editions as they have ever been before. To return for a moment more immediately to Colburn’s life, we find him still speculating in periodical literature, and with the same success as ever. In 1828 he commenced the _Court Journal_, and in the following year started the _United Service Magazine_, while for many years he possessed a considerable interest in the _Sunday Times_ newspaper; and all these periodicals are still held in popular esteem.