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The first entry he read aloud was headed "Hache ex-convict," succeeded by a description; following it were memoranda concerning several others of the gang; further on, the number and street of the shop, and at length an entry: "The Admiral, an individual of Brittany, who seems to have some connection with these people." "Oho!" he cried, "Monsieur Abbé, what do you say to this?"
Those who loved her grew almost to believe her she looks so like a little Sibyl when she says such things, yet her little one came almost without a cry, and in a few days the fairy mother was once more glinting about the house like a sunbeam. Well! well! I cannot make you see her as I know her: that I fear is certain. You might meet her, yet never know her from my description.
"A lady!" replied he; "yes, there's plenty of ladies of her description;" and then he informed me that she had many years ago been the mistress of a man of fortune who kept a carriage for her; but that he grew tired of her, and had given Trotter 200 pounds to marry her, and that now they did nothing but get drunk together and fight with each other.
Bumble, indeed, has passed into common use as the typical workhouse official of the least satisfactory sort. No less powerful than the picture of Oliver's wretched childhood is the description of the thieves' kitchen, presided over by Fagin.
The view from the summit of this ridge promised to be more extensive than any we had of late been enabled to obtain; and as far as actual observation went, we were not disappointed, although in every other particular, the landscape was one of the most unpromising description.
He has the gift of force and dramatic power, rather than of beauty and delicacy. He excels in suggestive vivid description, and he draws wonderful pictures of all out-of-doors, especially of the sea; but nature remains merely the background for the human figures. Much of his vividness lies in the use of specific words.
Those who have been very near drowning know well what this description means. The development of a photograph may not explain it, but it illustrates the curious and familiar fact of the revived recollections of the drowning man's experience. The sensitive plate has taken one look at a scene, and remembers it all,
There are, besides, true Smollett strokes in the scenes in the prison from which Melvil rescues Fathom, and there is a good deal of the satirical Smollett fun in the description of Fathom's ups and downs, first as the petted beau, and then as the fashionable doctor.
For Christ the power is clearly admitted, and there are little touches in the description of how it was exercised by Him which are extremely convincing to a psychic student. In the account of how He raised Lazarus from the grave after he had been four days dead far the most wonderful of all Christ's miracles it is recorded that as He went down to the graveside He was "groaning."
He is without question one of the best writers of our time, whether for comedy or for tragedy; and for extravaganza, too, as witness his lively farce called The Hand of Ethelberta. He can write dialogue or description. He is so excellent in either that either, as you read it, appears to make for your highest pleasure. If his characters talk, you would gladly have them talk to the end of the book.
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