This is taken at random, from the volume last published of the _Vicomte de Bragelonne_, in which romance the marvellous and Crichtonian musketeers, brought forward again, when hard upon threescore, show less sign of suffering from the march of years than does the narrative of their adventures from its unconscionable protraction. Much more than half the book is made up of such wearisome conferences as that above-cited, where the interlocutors carry on a sort of cut-and-thrust conversation, with an economy of words explicable by the fact that in a French feuilleton, or volume, one word of dialogue makes a line, as well as ten. With the assistance of his secretary, M. Maquet, and of his son, Alexander the Younger, M. Dumas gets through a prodigious amount of this sort of trash, at once productive to his pocket and damaging to his reputation; and then, when he finds publishers beginning to grumble, and the public detecting the device, and rejecting the windy repast, he applies himself in earnest, and produces something exceedingly good, of which he is quite capable, if once he gets the spur. It is to the necessity of thus occasionally redeeming his reputation, that we are indebted for the few really praiseworthy romances he has written--for the _Chevalier d'Harmental_, for the earlier portion of the _Mousquetaires_, and for his masterpiece, _Le Comte de Monte Christo_. His enemies and libellers have asserted, that the first-named of these books was written by M. Maquet, and only fathered by Dumas; but the assertion is absurd, and is belied by the book itself, replete with that vivid animation which characterises whatever Alexander writes. Moreover, the man who could write such a novel would have no need to purchase the name of M. Dumas. He would not lack a publisher, and his reputation would soon be made. We believe the fact to be, that Maquet is a sort of industrious drudge, employed by Dumas to rummage chronicles, and to collate and write down historical incidents and facts, for his employer to distort and expand into romances. For, as an historical romance writer, M. Dumas is utterly without a conscience. By him characters and events are twisted and turned as best suits his convenience. "I have twenty years' work before me," he is reported to have said, "to illustrate French history." Heaven knows what sort of an illustrator he is! We would advise no one to take their notions of French historical personages from M. Dumas' novels, or from his history either--for he writes history also, at times, and the only doubt is, which is the greatest fiction, his history or his romance. But for the titles, it were not always easy to distinguish between them. It were unfair, however, whilst quizzing his absurdities, to lose sight of his merits. These are numerous and remarkable. His spirit and vivacity of style are extraordinary; and we can call to mind no living writer superior to him for invention. _Monte Christo_ is his masterpiece. It