It was a transition age from the conventional to the natural; as in the admiration of landscape, the love for natural gardens, the gradual disappearance of the formal and empty compliment to which women had hitherto been treated, we find taste changing, so in literature the conventional was giving way to the natural. Fielding and Smollett had broken down the barriers in this respect, they had depicted life as it was, not as convention had decreed it should be, hence their gigantic success; but the life they saw and rendered was the life of a man of the world, with all its roughness and brutality. Jane Austen was the first to draw exactly what she saw around her in a humdrum country life, and to discard all incident, all adventure, all grotesque types, for perfect simplicity. She little understood what she was doing, but herein lies her wonderful power, she was a pioneer. Jane’s writing had nothing in common with Mrs. Radcliffe, whose style is mimicked in _Northanger Abbey_. It had absolutely no adventures. The fall of Louisa on the Cobb is perhaps the most thrilling episode in all the books, yet by virtue of its entire simplicity, its naturalness, its gaiety, her writing never fails to interest. Perhaps the most remarkable tribute to her genius lies in the fact that, though her books are simplicity itself, dealing with the love-stories of artless girls, they are read and admired not only by girls and women, but more especially by men of exceptional mental calibre. It has been said that the appreciation of them is a test of intellect. Though her novels are novels of sentiment, they never drift into sickly sentiment, they are wholesome and healthy throughout. With tragedy she had nothing to do; her work is comedy, pure comedy from beginning to end. And as comedies well done are the most recreative of all forms of reading, it is no wonder that, slight as are her plots, hardly to be considered, minute as are the incidents, the attention of readers should ever be kept alive. In all her books marriage is the supreme end; the meeting, the obstacles, the gradual surmounting of these, and the happy ending occur with the regularity of clockwork. And yet each one differs from all the others, and she is never monotonous. Every single book ends well, and it is a striking fact that there is not a death in one of them. When, after a slight improvement, Marianne, in _Sense and Sensibility_, grows worse—