ordinary reader, much more easily understood and sympathized with, Carlyle is much the stronger character, and his work has influenced English thought more profoundly.

Macaulay's greatest work is read to-day more for the brilliancy of his style and the power and realism of his characterizations than for the accuracy of his judgments or his contributions to historical knowledge. On the other hand, Carlyle's Cromwell is not only good history, but it has reversed the judgment of the English people, and led to the recognition of its hero as the second founder of English liberties. His French Revolution and Frederick the Great are perhaps the most noteworthy works of their class in the English language, and the latter practically exhausts the historical materials of the period. Yet his most characteristic work is found in his literary and critical essays, which rise to a higher intellectual plane than any which preceded them, and have probably not been excelled by any similar productions in the whole range of literature.

Among the poets who were strictly contemporary with Macaulay were Byron, Shelley, Keats, Southey, Coleridge, and Wordsworth. The last three were born between 1770 and 1775, but the greater part of their work was done during Macaulay's lifetime. All may be ranked among England's greatest poets. "Kubla Khan," "Christabel," and "The Ancient Mariner" by

Coleridge, the "Ode on Intimations of Immortality" and "Lines written at Tintern Abbey" by Wordsworth, and the "Lyrics" of Shelley are among the noblest products of poetic genius to be found in any language.

Another famous contemporary was Sydney Smith, the greatest of English wits, of whom Macaulay speaks characteristically in one of his letters as follows:

"The other day as I was changing my neckcloth, which my wig had disfigured, my good landlady knocked at the door of my bedroom and told me that Mr. Smith wished to see me, and was in my room below. Of all names by which men are called there is none which conveys a less determinate idea to the mind than that of Smith. .. Down I went, and, to my utter amazement, beheld the Smith of Smiths, Sydney Smith, alias Peter Plymley. I had forgotten his very existence till I discerned the queer contrast between the clerical amplitude of his person and the most unclerical wit, whim, and petulance of his eye.

...

I am very well pleased at having this opportunity of becoming better acquainted with a man who, in spite of innumerable affectations and oddities, is certainly one of the wittiest and most original writers. of our times. . . . I have really taken a great liking to him. He is full of wit, humor, and shrewdness. He is not one of the show-talkers who reserve all their good things for special occasions. It seems to

be his greatest luxury to keep his wife and daughters laughing for two or three hours every day."

In the course of Macaulay's life he came into close personal acquaintance not only with political leaders, but with many of the more noted authors of his time. Many allusions to them occur in his letters, which are interesting, as they indicate his mental attitude towards writers whose standing was not at that time established. A few of these allusions are quoted below.1

“Pride and Prejudice and the five sister novels remained without a rival in his affections. He never for a moment wavered in his allegiance to Miss Austen. In 1858 he wrote in his journal: 'If I could get materials I really would write a short life of that wonderful woman, and raise a little money to put up a monument to her in Winchester Cathedral.'

In a letter to his sister he says:

"I am glad you have read Madame de Staël's Allemagne. The book is a foolish one in many respects, but it abounds with information and shows great mental power. She was certainly the first woman of her age; Miss Edgeworth, I think, the second; and Miss Austen the third."

1 These allusions and many more may be found in Trevelyan's Life of Macaulay, which is one of the few great biographies in the English language. Every student of Macaulay ought to be familiar with this work.

Of Lord Byron he says:

"The worst thing that I know about Lord Byron is the very unfavorable impression he made upon men who certainly were not inclined to judge him harshly, and who, as far as I know, were never personally illused by him. I have heard hundreds and thousands of people, who never saw him, rant about him; but I never heard a single expression of fondness for him fall from the lips of any of those who knew him well." The following extract from a letter to the editor of the Edinburgh Review is especially interesting:

OCT. 19, 1842.

"Dear Napier: This morning I received Dickens's book. I have now read it. It is impossible for me to review it; nor do I think you would wish me to do so. I cannot praise it, and I will not cut it up. I cannot praise it though it contains a few lively dialogues and descriptions; for it seems to me to be on the whole a failure. A reader who wants an amusing account of the United States had better go to Mrs. Trollope, coarse and malignant as she is. A reader who wants information about American politics, manners, and literature had better go even to so poor a creature as Buckingham. In short, I pronounce the book, in spite of some gleams of genius, at once frivolous and dull.

"Therefore I shall not praise it. Neither will I

attack it; first, because I have eaten salt with Dickens; secondly, because he is a good man and a man of real talent; thirdly, because he hates slavery as heartily as I do; and fourthly, because I wish to see him enrolled in our blue and yellow corps, where he may do excellent service as a skirmisher and sharpshooter."

He had a great admiration for Miss Edgeworth, the accomplished author of Castle Rackrent, Ormond, Moral Tales, etc.

"Among all the incidents connected with the publication of his History, nothing pleased Macaulay so much as the gratification which he contrived to give Maria Edgeworth, as a small return for the enjoyment which, during more than fifty years, he had derived from her charming writings. That lady, who was in her eighty-third winter and within a few months of her death, says, in the course of a letter addressed to Dr. Holland: 'And now, my good friend, I require you to believe that all the admiration I have expressed for Macaulay's work is quite uninfluenced by the self-satisfaction, pride, surprise, I had in finding my own name in a note! I had formed my opinion, and expressed it to my friends who were reading the book to me, before I came to that note. Moreover, there was a mixture of shame, and a tinge of pain, with the pleasure and pride I felt in having a line in