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PEACOCK 53
was folly, who judged every question in
politics, philosophy, literature, and art on its
merits, and whose scorn for those who judged
otherwise was expressed without any of those
obliging circumlocutions that are prized so
highly in political life. With the exception
possible
of Prof. Saintsbury, not one of
has understood his
Peacock's interpreters
position or shared his point of view did not
;
Dr. Arthur Button Young, the editor of these
plays, himself affirm that
" his stories deal with tangible realities, and
not with obscure or absurd situations, as is the
case with those of many novelists. . . . For
this reason alone they deserve to be widely
of corruption, quackery, and worldliness " with which he
surrounds them], instead of bringing the virtue of his hero
into stronger relief, serves only to make more conspicuous
his own want of constancy in his purpose and faith in his
principles."
Spedding solemnly proceeds to give Peacock a. little advice
about the construction of his novels, and recommends that
" Melincourt " should be divided into two stories : one to
deal with the adventures of Sir Oran Haut-ton and his election
for the borough of Onevote ; the other to treat of " the
graver questions concerning the realizations of the spirit of
chivalry under the forms of modern society . . . with
Forester and Anthelia for the central figures."
" If he would but set about this latter task in a faithful
which the
spirit, we do not fear to predict, from the specimen
tale before us, even in its present state, exhibits, that he
would produce a work of far higher and more enduring interest
than any he has ye^ attempted."
Let the reader consider " Melincourt," what manner of
work it is, and then judge faithfully between me and Sir Fred.