Thackeray’s early books are not remarkable. Samuel Titmarsh and even Barry Lyndon are not and never have been popular. It was not until 1848, a dozen years after Dickens (a year the younger man) had become famous with Pickwick, that Thackeray really took his place among the great English novelists on the publication of Vanity Fair. Thackeray’s novels never attained the sale that Dickens’s did, and never yielded anything like as much money. The sub-title of Vanity Fair was “A Novel Without a Hero.” The heroine, Becky Sharpe, however, was hero and heroine in one. It is said that Thackeray’s women are weak; but no finer portrayal of feminine character is to be found in modern literature than that of Becky Sharpe in Vanity Fair. The Newcomes is considered a greater novel by some. It presents much more lovable characters. Colonel Newcome being one of the most lovable in fiction; and Clive Newcome, and Ethel Newcome whom he loves, are of the same stuff as the well bred, educated people we see about us and number as our friends and most cherished companions. Pendennis is in the same vein as The Newcomes, and involves some of the same characters, but it is not so strong a novel by any means, though perhaps more sentimental. Henry Esmond is an historical novel, and may perhaps be considered the highest type of historical novel ever written. It never has had the popularity of Scott’s, but its characters are undoubtedly much stronger and more carefully drawn than any of his. Lady Castlewood and Beatrix are as real as if they had lived in the flesh, and yet as interesting as any a romancer ever imagined. His fifth great novel is The Virginians, a sort of sequel to Esmond. Only five novels! but they are of a kind to do for Thackeray what Les Miserables did for Victor Hugo as compared with the popular and productive Dumas. Thackeray and Hugo are both most admired, and rank highest in the literary firmament, in spite of the perennial popularity of Dickens and Dumas. We have now considered the great romantic artists, who cared for point of view, Gothic castles, and the events of history; and likewise the great domestic story tellers, who, like Dickens, have sacrificed plot and scene to character portrayal.