need of employing any of these. Frequently the nature of the talk indicates sufficiently the speaker; and it is often possible and well to introduce the name of the character addressed. The simple device of altering the relative position of the verb and the subject is not to be despised. In the extract just given the ear would receive as a relief and a boon a single "he said" among so many "said he's." Opening Stevenson's "Treasure Island" almost at random, and taking the words on a couple of pages which indicate the speakers and their utterances, I find these :

Observed Silver. .. Cried the cook.

turned Morgan.

ver.

Re

Agreed Silver.

Said Merry.

Said Morgan. . . Said the fellow with the bandage.

Observed another.

On a couple of pages of one of Hardy's books

... Said Henry. . . . Observed Mr. Mark. . . . Whis

...

The variety does not come by chance, but by care and a finely trained perception of the value of trifles. It is of importance that the exact significance and intensity of the verb employed be taken. into account. There is a distinct difference between "dashed in" and "continued;" between "cried" and "exclaimed." The author should have a sense of the mood and manner of his per

sonages so clear and so fine that only

one of all

the possible words shall seem to him fit. If his dialogue is at all related to real life, it will so vary in its fine shadings that the terms indicating the manner of utterance will vary naturally and inevitably.

The interspersion of comments in dialogues is another matter of detail which greatly increases or lessens the finish of work. It is often possible to give a much more lively and vivid presentation of the speakers if amid their talk are mixed bits of action or even of description. The two things to be observed are that there shall not be too much of this and that the interpolations shall be significant. The movement of the current of conversation must not be hindered. Trifles may be effectively used, yet it is one of the most difficult points of literary art so to use them. It is a good thing for the student to write little sketches in dialogue form; stories in which he is forced to depend almost entirely upon the talk itself for characterization and narrative. Readers as a rule do not care much for this sort of thing, and it is to be done as part of the training of the workman rather than for itself. To sum up this matter, it may be said that in interspersing Comment, as in all else that has to do with dialogue, the great secret lies in realizing the persons speaking and in allowing them to utter their own words, instead of making them speak the words of the author or stand aside while the author his thoughts himself.

expresses

XIX

CHARACTER AND PURPOSE

THE secret of character-drawing of course lies largely in the ability to understand and to appreciate character, but in its application to practical work it largely resolves itself into the power of realizing the personages of the tale. A striking example of how a vitalizing imagination can and may make the actors in a fiction real in spite of all drawbacks is furnished by George Meredith. George Meredith's style is a teasing madness; his characters talk as no human beings ever dreamed of talking; and yet these personages are so actual, so individual, so human, that it is impossible not to feel that if one of them were pricked, real, red, warm human blood would flow. They existed so vividly for the author that they exist vividly for the reader and convince in spite of all the author's mannerisms. The relation of an author to his puppets has been well put by Trollope when he says: :

The novelist has other aims than the elucidation of his plot. He desires to make his readers so intimately acquainted with his characters that the creatures of his brain should be to them speaking, moving, living, human creatures. This he can never do unless he

know those fictitious personages himself, and he can never know them unless he can live with them in the full reality of established intimacy.. He must learn to hate them and to love them. He must argue with them, quarrel with them, forgive them, and even submit to them. Autobiography, xiii.

Deliberate description of persons is seldom of much effect. Says Stevenson :—

Readers cannot fail to have remarked that what an author tells us of the beauty or the charm of his creatures goes for naught; that we know instantly better; that the heroine cannot open her mouth but what, all in a moment, the fine phrases of preparation fall from her like the robes from Cinderella, and she stands before us, self-betrayed, as a poor, ugly, sickly wench, or perhaps a strapping market-woman.- A Gossip on a Novel of Dumas's.

The same principle holds with mental traits. It is of little use to announce, and especially to announce early in a tale, what the character of an actor is. If the author declare that the fictitious person is this or that, he gives the reader a measure by which to criticise his performance. He puts into the hands of his public a rod wherewith to scourge him for whatever falls short of intention, and if tried for falling short of intention, who shall escape? If the reader is left to judge of character by deeds, he becomes himself responsible for any opinions which he may choose to hold. The rule which every student should adopt for himself is that character is to be indicated first by the acts of the personages in a tale, and secondly by their talk.

Description of character may be suggested, but it should not be direct if it is possible to avoid this. Of course I do not mean that there may not be a good deal of direct comment on character. I do mean, however, that while it will probably entertain the author to write this and may help him in understanding the people about whom he writes, the effect upon the reader will in most cases be exceedingly small. If you are in the habit of analyzing your mental experiences, I am confident that you will bear me out in saying that we are seldom much affected by any declaration on the part of the writer that a character is good, bad, or indifferent. If we have drawn the same conclusion from the story, that is from the events and the conversations, we may agree with the author; if we have not, we do not in the least accept his estimate.

This may seem a covert attack upon the whole school of analytical fiction, but it is meant merely to be a warning to practical workers. There is nothing in all literary art more enticing to a novelist than the vivisection of character, and especially in this introspective age is it difficult to write objectively and without what might be called mental rummaging. It is impossible not to feel that all this minute analysis of character, however interesting as psychological tract or treatise, distinctly injures the effect of a work as a whole. It changes the characters from living beings to subjects on the dissecting-table, and destroys the vitality of the tale. It is in our time the prevailing fashion, but