“Because our painters of life do not take into the account,—in fact know little of,—some of the most important circumstances which constitute life, in the best sense of the word. They lay hold of the great circumstances which happen to all, the landmarks of universal human existence, and overlook those which are not less interesting, though not universal. They take Love; and think it more becoming to describe a Letitia going to the altar with a lord F——, than a weaver and his thoughtful bride taking possession of their two rooms, after long waiting and anxiety. They take Bereavement; and think it the same thing whether they describe the manly grief of an Ormond for his gallant Ossory, or the silent woe of a poverty-stricken widow for her laborious and dutiful son. They take Birth; and would rather have a lady F—— bending over the infant heir of a lordly house, with a Thérèse in waiting ... (My dear, why not describe that which shall be as well as that which has been?)—a lady F—— and her infant, I say, than some rustic Mary holding up her boy to smile in father’s face when he comes home from the plough. There is no harm in all this, provided the mighty remainder is not overlooked, which is at the bottom of the most portentous heavings of society,—which explains all that is to many unaccountable in the doings of the world they live in. If the aristocracy cannot, by their own experience, get to know all that life is,—though they are born, love, marry, suffer, enjoy, and die, let some idea be given them of it by true images held up in the mirror of their studies.” “Yes; let humble life be shown to them in all its strong and strange varieties; not only in faithful butlers and housekeepers,—in pretty dairy-maids and gossiping barbers. Let us have in books, in pictures, and on the stage, working men and women, in the various periods of their struggles through life. In the meanwhile, these people should in fairness know that the aristocracy are less aware than is supposed,—less than they will be,—of what is being done and suffered on each side of their smooth and dull path.” “Let the artists be compassionately considered too, I pray,” said lord F——, smiling. “Granting all that can be urged about their limiting their choice of objects, let us be considerate till they have placed themselves at large. What, for instance, could a weaver of fiction make of our present life?” “Nothing of a story; only a picture; there being, as you said just now, apparent monotony without, and deep stirrings within. Such a writer, if wishing to make a narrative, must take either my former life,—its perplexities, its poverty, its struggles under its first publicity, its labours, its love, and migration into a new state;—or your future one,—the statesman’s honourable toils, joined with the patriot’s conflicts and consolations.” “But if there was good reason for taking up precisely the interval,—from our marriage till this hour;—what then?”