For a long time she and her sisters enjoyed Evelina's tribulations; then Fanny grew ambitious, and encouraged by her brother, thought of publication. When she tremblingly asked her father's consent, he carelessly countenanced the venture and gave it no second thought. After much negotiation, a publisher offered twenty pounds for the manuscript, and in 1778 the appearance of 'Evelina' ended Fanny Burney's obscurity. For a long time the book was the topic of boundless praise and endless discussion. Every one wondered who could have written the clever story, which was usually attributed to a society man. The great Dr. Johnson was enthusiastic, insisted upon knowing the author, and soon grew very fond of his little Fanny. He introduced her to his friends, and she became the celebrity of a delightful circle. Sir Joshua Reynolds and Burke sat up all night to finish 'Evelina.' The Thrales, Madame Delaney,--who later introduced her at court,--Sheridan, Gibbon, and Sir Walter Scott, were among those who admired her most cordially. It was a happy time for Fanny, encouraged to believe her talent far greater than it was. She wrote a drama which was read in solemn judgment by her father and "Daddy Crisp," who decided against it as too like 'Les Précieuses Ridicules,' a play she had never read. A second novel, 'Cecilia,' appeared in 1782, and was as successful as its predecessor. Later readers find it less spontaneous, and after it she never resumed her early style except in her journal and correspondence. Her ambition was fully astir. She had every incentive from her family and friends. But the old zest in composition had departed. The self-consciousness which had always tormented her in society seized her now, when she was trying to cater to public taste, and made her change her frank, free, personal expression for a stilted artificial formality of phrase. Her reputation was now at its height, and she was very happy in her position as society favorite and pride of the father whom she had always passionately admired, when she made the mistake of her life. Urged by her father, she accepted a position at court as Second Keeper of the Queen's Robes. There she spent five pleasureless and worse than profitless years. In her 'Diary and Letters,' the most readable to-day of all her works, she has told the story of wretched discomfort, of stupidly uncongenial companionship, of arduous tasks made worse by the selfish thoughtlessness of her superiors. She has also given our best historical picture of that time; the every-day life at court, the slow agony of King George's increasing insanity. But the drudgery and mean hardships of the place, and the depression of being separated from her family, broke down her health; and after much opposition she was allowed to resign in 1791.