What marks the whole of Disraeli's writings more than any other quality is the buoyant and radiant temperament of their author. In _Lothair_ he is like an inspired and enfranchised boy, set free from all the trammels of reality, and yet bringing to the service of his theme the results of an extraordinary inherited experience. If the picture is not real, we may take courage to say that it is far better than reality--more rich, more entertaining, more intoxicating. We have said that it is carelessly written, but that is part of the author's superb self-confidence, and when he is fortunately inspired, he obtains here an ease of style, a mastery which he had never found before. The sureness of his touch is seen in the epigrams which strew the pages of _Lothair_, and have become part of our habitual speech--the phrase about eating "a little fruit on a green bank with music"; that which describes the hansom cab, "'Tis the gondola of London." This may lead us on to the consideration that Disraeli is one of those who have felt most vividly and expressed most gaily the peculiar physical beauty of London. He saw the Park as the true Londoner sees it--when "the chestnuts are in silver bloom, and the pink may has flushed the thorns, and banks of sloping turf are radiant with plots of gorgeous flowers; when the water glitters in the sun, and the air is fragrant with that spell which only can be found in metropolitan mignonette." He describes as no one else has ever done with equal mastery a stately and successful house-party in a great country mansion. He had developed, when he composed _Lothair_, a fuller sense of beauty than he had ever possessed before, but it revelled in forms that were partly artificial and partly fabulous. An example of these forms may now be welcome:-- "Mr. Giles took an early easy opportunity of apprising Lady Farringford that she had nearly met Cardinal Grandison at dinner, and that his Eminence would certainly pay his respects to Mrs. Putney Giles in the evening. As Lady Farringford was at present a high ritualist, and had even been talked of as 'going to Rome,' this intelligence was stunning, and it was observed that her Ladyship was unusually subdued during the whole of the second course. "On the right of Lothair sate the wife of a Vice-Chancellor, a quiet and pleasing lady, to whom Lothair, with natural good breeding, paid snatches of happy attention, when he could for a moment with propriety withdraw himself from the blaze of Apollonia's coruscating conversation. Then there was a rather fierce-looking Red Ribbon, medalled as well as be-starred, and the Red Ribbon's wife, with a blushing daughter, in spite of her parentage not yet accustomed to stand fire. A partner and his unusually numerous family had the pleasure also of seeing Lothair for the first time, and there were no less than four M.P.'s, one of whom was even in office.