It is the neglect of this fact that has led to the common judgment that Thackeray is a cynic. The gulf that divides him from cynicism is seen when we compare him with Swift. There is always in Thackeray a sensitive kindliness not to be found in the older writer. Thackeray's bitterest satire is on individuals who are worse than their neighbours. There is something amiss with society when Barry Lyndon and Becky Sharp are possible; but we are not led to think that all men are Barry Lyndons, or all women Becky Sharps. _Gulliver_, on the contrary, is a satire on the human race. [Sidenote: William Carleton (1794-1869).] [Sidenote: Samuel Lover (1797-1868).] A group of Irish novelists, rather older than Thackeray and Dickens, may be noticed together for the sake of certain features they have in common. If fineness of literary quality alone were in question, the first place must be assigned to William Carleton, whose _Traits and Stories of the Irish Peasantry_ are the most carefully executed of their class. Carleton however had neither the verve nor the copiousness of Lever, who has been fixed upon by popular judgment as the leading Irish novelist of his time. Still less can the versatile Samuel Lover, song-writer, dramatist and painter as well as novelist, compete with Lever; for although the former did many things with a certain dexterity he did nothing really well. His _Handy Andy_ is a formless book, and the fun of it grows tedious. [Sidenote: Charles James Lever (1806-1872).] Charles James Lever came in direct literary descent from neither of these, but from William Hamilton Maxwell (1792-1850), whose _Stories from Waterloo_ turned Lever's attention to the literary possibilities of the great war. This book begot _Harry Lorrequer_, begun in the _Dublin University Magazine_ in 1837; and _Lorrequer_ was followed by _Charles O'Malley_ (1840). The former derived its name from the 'rollicking' quality generally recognised as characteristic of Lever. Both books have whatever attraction high spirits and plenty of fun and fighting and adventure can give; but in the literary sense they are rough and unpolished to the last degree. _Tom Burke of Ours_ (1844) shows the same qualities slightly chastened and reduced to a more literary shape. The change went on, and Lever paid more and more attention to construction and to literary law and rule. He himself considered _Sir Brook Fossbrooke_ (1866) his best book; but it may be questioned whether the gain in smoothness and regularity is sufficient to compensate for the partial loss of that rush of adventure and copiousness of anecdote which won for Lever his reputation, and still preserves it. [Sidenote: Charlotte Brontë (1816-1855), Emily Jane Brontë (1818-1848), Anne Brontë (1820-1849).]