estimable, are not always our most popular writers. Those authors who stoop to amuse the giddy throng, at the expense of their moral principles, are too often successful; but sterling merit will survive such worthless and temporary productions, as the ever-green flourishes in perennial beauty amid the decays of surrounding vegetation. Let not a passion for fame tempt the man of genius from the path of rectitude into the wild regions of licentious imagination. The task of an author is the most important imaginable; it is his duty to ameliorate the morals of society; but errors disseminated by his seductive eloquence, may deprave thousands of intelligent beings! Let him also reflect, that his most secret studies are open to the eye of an omnipresent Creator, to whom he must be accountable for the use he makes of his talents. Under this awful impression, he will devote his mental powers to virtue, and endeavour to the utmost of his abilities to instruct the reader.

The novels of Richardson, Fielding, Smollett, Goldsmith, delighted their contemporaries by faithful descriptions of nature, and exact exhibitions of character; and they still amuse. In imitation of those masterly romancers a host of inferior writers appeared, and

"Corresponding misses filled the ream,
With sentimental frippery and dream.”

But the works of these ephemera have long been removed from the shelves, and another race of novelists exerted their abilities to charm and astonish young ladies and gentlemen. That affectation of refined sentiment uttered in the silly phraseology, supposed by those sapient writers to be the perfection of fashionable conversation, was both ludicrous and nonsensical. Even Miss Edgeworth's Tales of Fashionable Life, are in some instances liable to this censure. What opportunity had this recluse spinster, or the still more refined old maid, Miss More, to make observations on persons of quality, except at the public theatre? Yet such censorious gossipping as fills their pages, has long been estimated by the ignorant reader as faithful sketches of characters and manners.

Another class of novel-writers, without the abilities of Mrs. D'Arblay, Miss More, or Miss Edgeworth; certain esquires, knights of the post, and ladies who have been abandoned by their protectors, sit down and compose such a farrago of scandal and falsehood as "The Spirit of the Book," "The private History of the Court of England," and similar literary forgeries for mere emolument, and written in a style which sets criticism at defiance. If such writers were to become English classics, we should soon degenerate into the barbarism of the fifteenth century;

but happily for the honour of our country, its language is too firmly established to yield to any innovation; such productions are the mere bubbles of literature, and like bubbles, they disappear successively, while the true imitations of nature and passion remain.

Yet let us not be too confident of the stability of our excellent language, for at this moment its purity is menaced by no common attempt to reintroduce vulgarity among us. In books, as in dress, and furniture, that capricious goddess, Fashion, from time to time assumes the authority of an arbitress, and her dictates are obeyed by the passive, the giddy, and the gay. Novelty ever charms the crowd, and whoever can produce something new, strange, and uncommon, may anticipate temporary success. Thus the metrical Tales of Walter Scott produced a rich harvest to the author and publisher, and the romances of an anonymous Scot, have since bewitched the gude folks of England, to a degree of frenzy unequalled even by that absurd rage for German novels and plays, which inflamed the imagination of thousands in London, in the beginning of the present century. Nothing less than the blasphemous execrations of continental banditti, and atheistical villains, could satisfy the lovers of sublime composition then; and it appears, that nothing but the coarse manners,

savage ferocity, disgusting amours, and insane raving of Caledonian fanatics, and lunatics, can please now. Even the public theatre resounds the melodious names of Donocha Dhu, Dumbidikes, Madge Wildfire, and Macgregor; and sober citizens, with their wives and daughters, eagerly peruse the adventures of profligates, Border robbers, and Scotch beldams, in the drawing room; or hasten to behold the representation of those interesting personages on the stage, where, happily for the morals of the auditory, the characteristic sentiments of knaves, and fools, are mostly delivered in a dialect which requires the aid of a glossary.

By adroit management those northern bubbles have been kept afloat for several months, to the great emolument of the authors and publishers. The authors, for it cannot be supposed that such exquisite productions of genius emanate from a single mind, have hitherto, like our literary reviewers, worked unseen, and as darkness is one source of sublime emotion, obscurity renders their romances doubly valuable. Various modes of puffing have been resorted to for the excitement of public curiosity, and to effect the transfer of the aurum tangible from English into Scottish coffers. Sometimes Walter Scott is the reputed author, then the son of a Scotch Baronet, whose honourable parent will not let

him publish his name as a romancer, is reputed to be the enviable favourite; but the probability is, that those novels and tales are the offspring of the brains of several money-loving Scotchmen, including those original geniuses, the EDINBURGH REVIEWERS. Hence, the success of Caledonian Romances is almost certain, for the publishers have two strings to their bow; first, an unequalled production of genius, the principal beauties of which are concealed in language as unintelligible as the prophetic responses of the ancient oracle at Delphos, and afterwards, the advantage of a favourable review by a friend to the firm.

Like our successful tragedians, those authors have profited by the influence over the mind of the reader, obtainable by a masterly development of the violent passions of human nature. Hence, delight and terror are alternately excited, and the attention captivated by those celebrated narratives. They have also chosen a remote period for the fable, the incidents of which are narrated in a dialect, the obscurity and barbarism of which places it beyond the of English criticism. Indeed, these ingenious novelists may be compared to alchymists, who have discovered that long-sought-for desideratum, the philosopher's stone, by which Caledonian brass is transmuted into English gold,

grasp.

R