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are concealed under a rough and uncouth outside. The humourists therefore ought to have a place, and not a scanty one, in the program of our English readings. ¹)

Applying the aforesaid to the particular author before us, it is difficult to say what should recommend Byron more than many others in an educational course of reading. We may read his works from beginning to end without being much the wiser as to English institutions and their history. Though a born senator, he has scarcely taken any part in the public affairs of his country and if, in his writings, we find an allusion to politics, it is merely in the way of personal satire. Indeed he is altogether an unpolitical character; his heroes are strong-minded individuals whose passions brook no restraint, no control, no discipline, who contemptuously isolate themselves from the common herd, disdaining even to guide or use them for higher pur- poses; not one that represents or embodies a common cause, a national or humane tendency, unless it be the vindication of unrestrained individualism. If we meet with noble strains in praise of liberty, with passionate and indignant declamation against tyranny, these never go beyond generalities, there is no dramatic struggle for liberty, no revolt, successful or unsuccess- ful, against tyranny. Much less do we anywhere find a representation of that„battle for Right“ of which the whole history of England offers the most persistent aud most consistent example. Let us not look in Byron for what we may find in Shakespeare, in the best English historians and orators: a picture of the struggle of classes for domination or for emancipation, the struggle of nations for greatness and ascendency, the struggle between opposed principles of religion or civilisation, which all make up the real history of states and of mankind. We find in Byron generally only the individual, and the individual, discontented and at war with the world as it is, without any ideal as to how it ought to be, or attempt at changing or improving it, isola- ting himself in gloomy and desperate defiance.

If a lively conception and sharp delineation of individual character in all its infinite variety is in general the distinctive mark of English literature, there again Byron is not pecu- liarly Englisn. We, do not find in his works a gallery of life-like portraits, each individual different from all others, but always like himself, consistent with his own distinct nature and, taken collectively, forming an epitome of mankind. Byron has conceived and represented only a few twpes of character, indeed, if we neglect those of minor interest, only one: that of the

4) Schrader, in his„Erziehungs- und Unterrichtslehre für Gumnasien und Realsehulen(p. 497), says: „Die Humoristen des vorigen Jahrhundérts sind ebenso wie die Romane der Gegenwart zurückazustellen.“ Let us pass sentence on the latter— not without some reserve though—; but it would be difficult to obtain a verdict against the humorists from an enlightened jury or even to weaken Thackerag's eloquent pleading in favour of them:„The humorous writer professes to awaken and direct your love, your pity, your kindness,— your scorn for untruth, pretension, imposture,— your tenderness for the weak, the poor, the oppressed, the unhappy“ etc. and again:„Noble and illustrious names of Swift, and Pope, and Addison! dear and honoured memories of Goldsmith and Fielding! kind friends, teachers, benefactors!“