Produced by Chuck Greif and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This book was produced from scanned images of public domain material from the Google Print project.) Aspects and Impressions By Edmund Gosse, C.B. D.Litt. of Cambridge University; LL.D. of St. Andrews Cassell and Company, Ltd London, New York, Toronto and Melbourne 1922 To My Friend JOHN C. SQUIRE Poet, Editor, and Critic These Essays are mainly reprinted from _The Edinburgh Review_, _The London Mercury_, _The Modern Languages Review_, and _The Fortnightly Review_. "Malherbe and the Classical Reaction" was the Taylorian Lecture at Oxford for 1920, and is included here by the courtesy of the authorities of the University. Contents PAGE GEORGE ELIOT 1 HENRY JAMES 17 SAMUEL BUTLER 55 A NOTE ON CONGREVE 77 THE FIRST DRAFT OF SWINBURNE'S "ANACTORIA" 87 THE HÔTEL DE RAMBOUILLET 97 MALHERBE AND THE CLASSICAL REACTION 123 THE FOUNDATION OF THE FRENCH ACADEMY 145 ROUSSEAU IN ENGLAND IN THE NINETEENTH CENTURY 169 THE CENTENARY OF LECONTE DE LISLE 193 TWO FRENCH CRITICS: EMILE FAGUET--REMY DE GOURMONT 203 THE WRITINGS OF M. CLEMENCEAU 225 A VISIT TO THE FRIENDS OF IBSEN 247 FAIRYLAND AND A BELGIAN ARIOSTO 261 SOME RECOLLECTIONS OF LORD WOLSELEY 273 INDEX 291 Aspects and Impressions GEORGE ELIOT In and after 1876, when I was in the habit of walking from the north-west of London towards Whitehall, I met several times, driven slowly homewards, a victoria which contained a strange pair in whose appearance I took a violent interest. The man, prematurely ageing, was hirsute, rugged, satyr-like, gazing vivaciously to left and right; this was George Henry Lewes. His companion was a large, thickset sybil, dreamy and immobile, whose massive features, somewhat grim when seen in profile, were incongruously bordered by a hat, always in the height of the Paris fashion, which in those days commonly included an immense ostrich feather; this was George Eliot. The contrast between the solemnity of the face and the frivolity of the headgear had something pathetic and provincial about it.