GOOD TASTE—AND NO VEL READING ,
There is no objection to a little dessert after a
hearty dinner, and should be none to a little in
dulgence in novel reading on the part of the col
lege student who has done justice to a meal of
mathematics and applied science. But lemon ice
would be, although pleasant, scarely a nourishing
article for steady diet. Just so with the novel.
This is to be a lay sermon on novels, by one
who is no critic by profession, but who lias rav
aged the whole list of authors from old Cap Col
lier up (or down ?) to Ibsen and come to certain
conclusions which are offered for what they arc
worth. There is development in appreciation for
fiction just as in any other faculty of intellect or
sense, and this development is bound to be up
ward if one 'gives it opportunity. The same is
true in many other fields, People with an un
cultured ear for music actually prefer “After the
Ball” to “Schubert’s Serenade,” and think it af
fectation for others to express a preference for
classical music. But if they should study music
for years themselves, their own convictions would
become the same, inevitably and sincerely. So in
art. Any child would prefer a colored chromo
presented by some Sarsaparilla fakir, to an etch
ing by Gefome, but not so a person of refined
taste.
Good taste is a real virtue. Even savages have
it in some things, for we arc told that in the best
circles of the Cannibal Islands chides and cigarette
fiends aic excluded from the cuisine.
Prof. Bryce, in the American Commonwealth,
after applauding highly various characteristics of
the American people, deplores their proneness to
admire quantity rather than quality, and to pre
fer bizarre effects to genuine accomplishments,
It is gratifying to feel, however, that in science,
art and literature, we are becoming more thor
ough day by day.
What are the characteristics of the best novels ?
A hard question. It is easier to answer what arc
the best novels. In this, individual preference
THE FREE LANCE.
must have much influence. I have tried to think
what ten novels I should pick out if I were con
demned to have no other reading in the lines of
fiction for the rest of my life. Here they are :
“Les Miserables,” Victor Hugo; “Robison Cru
soe,” Defoe; “The Newcomes,” Thackeray;
“David Copperficld,” Dickens; “Lorna Doone,”
Blackstone; *‘lvan hoe,” Scott; “The Deerslay
cr,” Cooper; “Plain Tales from the Hills,” Kip
ling; “The Master of Ballantrae,” Stevenson;
“Tess of the D’Urbervillcs,” Thos Hardy.
Nothing in this list by George Elliot, or Tol
stoi or Ibsen, or Sarah Grand, I am sorry, but I
must get in my ten favorites. I couldn’t include
anything from the last three mentioned in the
best hundred novels. But I think “Les Misera
bles ” the greatest work of fiction ever written
and so do three people out of four who have read
it. Robert Louis Stevenson and Thackeray are
the writers of the best English prose ever put to
gether, and Rudyard Kipling is the writer of the
most graphic short stories ever imagined in all the
world’s history. If lie shall try some day he may
write a greater novel than “Les Miserables.”
“Trilby,” is a splendid story but not one of the
ten. The fiction of the new papers and maga
zines to-day is good but none of it, I think, im
mortal. Conan Doyle, Stanley Weyman, and
Mark Twain, for instance. Popular fiction “Mr.
Barnes of New York,” and E. P. Roe’s works,
sell but they are not literature. Try to read one
of them a second time and see how disgusted you
become. Apply the same test to “Les Misera
bles,” or even “Robison Crusoe,” and learn the
difference.
This whole subject of the best fiction is an in
teresting one, and a debatable one. No doubt
the Free Lance would welcome contributions on
FROM A MILITARY POINT OF VIEW.
The fact that we are related to the militia of the
State through the law which makes cadet captains
Quisquis