Criticism of the kind just quoted, hurts only the man who utters it and the community which tolerates it. It injured the reputation of the country far more than the work could that it criticised. "Home as Found," as a matter of fact, was prevented from doing any harm, partly by its excessive exaggeration but more by its excessive poorness. As a story it stood in marked contrast to its immediate predecessor. It was as difficult to accompany Cooper on land as it had been to abandon him when on the water. The tediousness of the tale is indeed something appalling to the most hardened novel-reader. The only interest it can possibly have at this day is from the opportunity it affords of studying one phase of the author's character, and of accounting for much of the bitter hostility with which he was assailed. While he was lecturing his countrymen on manners, his own were spoken of in turn in a way that gave especial delight to the enemies he had (p. 160) made by his criticisms. In 1837 Lockhart's "Life of Sir Walter Scott" was appearing. In the diary of that novelist were some references to the American author. "This man," he said, describing his first interview, "who has shown so much genius, has a good deal of the manners, or want of manners, peculiar to his countrymen." Cooper's personal acquaintance with Scott had begun in 1826, just after the latter had set about his gigantic effort to pay off the load of debt in which he had involved himself. The American novelist had made then an attempt to secure for the man he regarded as his master some adequate return from the vast sale of his works in the United States. In this he had been foiled. In the "Knickerbocker Magazine" for April, 1838, he gave an account of these fruitless negotiations. In a later number of the same year he reviewed Lockhart's biography. This work is well known as one of the most entertaining in our literature. But on its appearance it gave a painful shock to the admirers of the great author by the revelations it made of practices which savored more of the proverbial canniness of the Scotchman than of the lofty spirit of the man of honor. Equally surprising was the unconsciousness of the biographer, that there was anything discreditable in what he disclosed. Cooper criticised Scott's conduct in certain matters with a good deal of severity. In regard to some points he took extreme, and what might fairly be deemed Quixotic ground. Yet the general justice of his article will hardly be denied now by any one who is fully cognizant of the facts. Nor, indeed, was it then. "I have just read," wrote Charles Sumner from London to Hillard, in January, 1839, "an article on Lockhart's 'Scott,' written by (p. 161) Cooper in the "Knickerbocker," which was lent me by Barry Cornwall. I think it capital. I see none of Cooper's faults; and I think a proper castigation is applied to the vulgar minds of Scott and Lockhart. Indeed, the nearer I approach the circle of these men the less disposed