2. Nevertheless, he is always prolix. That the novels as published varied in length from four to eight volumes is not really significant, since these were the very small volumes which (as a source of extra profit) were to be the regular form for novels until after the time of Scott. Even 'Clarissa,' the longest, is not longer than some novels of our own day. Yet they do much exceed the average in length and would undoubtedly gain by condensation. Richardson, it may be added, produced each of them in the space of a few months, writing, evidently, with the utmost fluency, and with little need for revision. 3. Most permanently important, perhaps, of all Richardson's contributions, was his creation of complex characters, such as had thitherto appeared not in English novels but only in the drama. In characterization Richardson's great strength lay with his women--he knew the feminine mind and spirit through and through. His first heroine, Pamela, is a plebeian serving-maid, and his second, Clarissa, a fine-spirited young lady of the wealthy class, but both are perfectly and completely true and living, throughout all their terribly complex and trying experiences. Men, on the other hand, those beyond his own particular circle, Richardson understood only from the outside. Annoyed by criticisms to this effect, he attempted in the hero of his last book to present a true gentleman, but the result is only a mechanical ideal figure of perfection whose wooden joints creak painfully as he moves slowly about under the heavy load of his sternly self-conscious goodness and dignity. 4. Richardson's success in his own time was perhaps chiefly due to his striking with exaggerated emphasis the note of tender sentiment to which the spirit of his generation was so over-ready to respond. The substance of his books consists chiefly of the sufferings of his heroines under ingeniously harrowing persecution at the hands of remorseless scoundrels. Pamela, with her serving-maid's practical efficiency, proves able to take care of herself, but the story of the high-bred and noble-minded Clarissa is, with all possible deductions, one of the most deeply-moving tragedies ever committed to paper. The effect in Richardson's own time may easily be imagined; but it is also a matter of record that his novels were commonly read aloud in the family circle (a thing which some of their incidents would render impossible at the present day) and that sometimes when the emotional strain became too great the various listeners would retire to their own rooms to cry out their grief. Richardson appealed directly, then, to the prevailing taste of his generation, and no one did more than he to confirm its hold on the next generation, not only in England, but also in France and Germany.