As the essence of self-made man, it may be thought that Sir Willoughby is meant to represent an unpleasant and an unusual type. Not so at all. If it had not been for Meredith, he might have gone tranquilly down to the grave, and not even his worst enemy would have had very obvious cause to scent the wolf within him. We meet him first upon his majority--a very fascinating and fastidious young Englishman whom we gradually understand is the letter ‘I’ vivified and made human, mentally as well as physically straightened to its erectness, and as uncompromisingly personal. We heedlessly learn of his dallying with Lætitia Dale, of the silent and unexacting worship of this soft rhyming representative of ‘starving women’ who endure their hunger uncomplainingly, and are too proud to offer themselves for the sensational pity of a world ever in demand of dramatic situations. We enjoy a secret satisfaction in his discomfiture when Constantia Durham leaves him in the lurch and runs off with the more cheerful military figure, and yet we still hardly realize what manner of man he is when he in turn plants Lætitia and seeks distraction in three years’ travel. Meredith makes us understand that he is a youth of spurious niceness, who objected to his betrothed talking freely about male cousins and friends, and considered the pursuit of competing admirers a stain upon her. Cloistral purity was his demand in the market; woman emerging from an eggshell, ‘somewhat more astonished at things than a chicken ... and seeing him, with her sex’s eyes, first of all men.’ How much we thank Meredith for showing us the ‘infinite grossness’ of this demand! And how we relish his quiet laughter at Sir Willoughby’s loathing of the ‘dust of the world’ touching the privileged object of his choice. We conclude that Miss Durham was a young person of spirit and sense when she ran off with Captain Oxford, and heartily wish her good luck upon her wedding-tour, while Sir Willoughby abroad is holding an ‘English review of his Maker’s grotesques.’ What a delightful stroke that is against the British tourist! Thackeray never matched it. If you would measure it fully, you have but to stand apart and watch the faces and listen to the criticisms of our fellow-countrymen abroad. Everything that is not British is grotesque.