for such a burden as this would impose. Sainte-Beuve’s letter, filling two and a half columns with its 5,500 words, had meanwhile appeared in the _Evening Post_, under the heading “Literary Matters in France.” The greater part was devoted to a beautifully written and fine critical disquisition upon the recently published correspondence of Béranger, but prefixed to this were several paragraphs of general comment. “French literature for some years past has produced nothing very new or brilliant,” he wrote, “especially in the department of poetry.... But in the department of history, political and literary, and in that of erudition, good books and meritorious monographs have been written.” Political events since 1848, he explained, had thrown many men into a retirement favorable to literary pursuits--Villemain, Guizot, Remusat, and Victor Cousin. In closing he alluded to the loss the Institut de France had suffered in Macaulay, and added: “The death of the illustrious Prescott had already deprived the same learned body of a corresponding member. It is thought that America will also provide the member to be named as Prescott’s successor (_primo avulso non deficit alter_), and we are informed that some influential members of that academy have thought of Mr. Motley, whose admirable historical work has been recently introduced here by M. Guizot.” The article was not signed, and was not appreciated by a public which cared nothing about Béranger. Bryant grasped this general indifference. He wrote Bigelow that the letter was too long, and that Americans were not sufficiently familiar with French authors to have that craving for anecdotes of their lives, conversation, and correspondence which they had in the case of the distinguished names of English literature. He always distrusted an article his wife would not read, he said, and she would not read this. Probably short letters of not more than 2,000 words, sent not oftener than monthly, and dealing with topics of wide interest, would--especially if signed by Sainte-Beuve--have been highly successful; it was unfortunate that Bigelow, when Sainte-Beuve indicated his reluctance to accept the heavy burden of long essays, did not suggest this solution. But the Civil War was at hand, and the columns of the paper were soon crowded to bursting.