A History of the French Novel, Vol. 2

by George Saintsbury

  CHAPTER VIII

  DUMAS THE ELDER

  [Sidenote: The case of Dumas.]

  With Dumas[311] _pere_ the same difficulties (or nearly the same) ofgeneral and particular nature present themselves as those which occurredwith Balzac. There is, again, the task--not so arduous and by no meansso hopeless as some may think, but still not of the easiest--of writingpretty fully without repetition on subjects on which you have writtenfully already. There is the enormous bulk, far greater than in the othercase, of the work: which makes any complete survey of its individualcomponents impossible. And there is the wide if not universal knowledgeof this or that--if not of this _and_ that--part of it; which makes suchsurvey unnecessary and probably unwelcome. But here, as there, inwhatever contrast of degree and kind, there is the importance inrelation to the general subject, which needs pretty abundant notice, andthe particular character of that importance, which demands specialexamination.

  There are probably not quite so many readers as there might have been ageneration ago who would express indignation at the idea that the twonovelists can be held in any degree[312] comparable. Between the twoperiods a pretty strong and almost concerted effort was made by personsof no small literary position, such as Mr. Lang, Mr. Stevenson, and Mr.Henley, who are dead, and others, some of whom are alive, to follow thelead of Thackeray many years earlier still. They denounced, supportingthe denunciation with all the literary skill and vigour of which theywere capable, the notion, common in France as well as in England, thatDumas was a mere _amuseur_, whether they did or did not extend theirbattery to the other notion (common then in England, if not in France)that he was an amuser whose amusements were pernicious. These effortswere perhaps not entirely ineffectual: let us hope that actual reading,by not unintelligent or prejudiced readers, had more effect still.

  [Sidenote: Charge and discharge.]

  But let us also go back a little and, adding one, repeat what thecharges against Dumas are. There is the moral charge just mentioned;there is the not yet mentioned charge of plagiarism and "devilling"; andthere is the again already mentioned complaint that he is a mere"pastimer"; that he has no literary quality; that he deserves at best totake his chance with the novelists from Sue to Gaboriau who have been orwill be dismissed with rather short shrift elsewhere. Let us, as bestseems to suit history, treat these in order, though with very unequaldegrees of attention.

  [Sidenote: Morality.]

  The moral part of the matter needs but a few lines. The objection herewas one of the still fewer things that did to some extent justify and"_sens_ify" the nonsense and injustice since talked about Victoriancriticism. In fact this nonsense may (there is always, or nearlyalways, some use to be made even of nonsense) be used against itsearlier brother. It is customary to objurgate Thackeray as too moral.Thackeray never hints the slightest objection on this score againstthese novels, whatever he may do as to the plays. For myself, I do notpretend to have read everything that Dumas published. There may be amongthe crowd something indefensible, though it is rather odd that if thereis, I should not merely never have read it but never have heard of it.If, on the other hand, any one brings forward Mrs. Grundy's opinion onthe Ketty and Milady passages in the _Mousquetaires_; on the story ofthe origin of the Vicomte de Bragelonne; on the way in which the divineMargot was consoled for her almost tragic abandonment in a few hours bylover and husband--I must own that as Judge on the present occasion Ishall not call on any counsel of Alexander's to reply. "Bah! it isbosh," as the greatest of Dumas' admirers remarks of another matter.

  [Sidenote: Plagiarism and devilling.]

  The plagiarism (or rather devilling + plagiarism) article of theindictment, tedious as it may be, requires a little longer notice. Thefacts, though perhaps never to be completely established, aresufficiently clear as far as history needs, on the face of them. Dumas'works, as published in complete edition, run to rather over threehundred volumes. (I have counted them often on the end-papers of thebeloved tomes, and though they have rather a knack, like the windows ofother enchanted houses, of "coming out" different, this is near enough.)Excluding theatre (twenty-five volumes), travels, memoirs, and so-calledhistory, they must run to about two hundred and fifty. Most if not allof these volumes are of some three hundred pages each, very closelyprinted, even allowing for the abundantly "spaced" conversation. Ishould say, without pretending to an accurate "cast-off," that any_three_ of these volumes would be longer even than the great"part"-published works of Dickens, Thackeray, or Trollope; that any_two_ would exceed in length our own old average "three-decker"; andthat any _one_ contains at least twice the contents of the averagesix-shilling masterpiece of the present day.

  Now it stands to reason that a man who spent only the later part of hisworking life in novel-production, who travelled a great deal, and who,according to his enemies, devoted a great deal of time to relaxation,[313] is not likely to have written all this enormous bulk himself, evenif it were physically possible for him to have done so. One may gofarther, and say that pure internal evidence shows that the whole was_not_ written by the same person.

  [Sidenote: The Collaborators?]

  As for the actual collaborators--the "young men," as Thackerayobligingly called them, who carried out the works in a less funerealsense than that in which the other "young men" carried out Ananias andSapphira--that is a question on which I do not feel called upon to enterat any length. Anybody who cannot resist curiosity on the point mayconsult Alphonse Karr (who really might have found something fitter onwhich to expend his energies); Querard, an ill-tempered bibliographer,for whom there is the excuse that, except ill-temper, idleness, with aparticularly malevolent Satan to find work for its hands to do, or merehunger, hardly anything would make a man a bibliographer of his sort;and the person whom the law called Jacquot, and he himself by thehandsomer title of Eugene de Mirecourt. Whether Octave Feuilletexercised himself in this other kind before he took to his true line ofnovels of society; whether that ingenious journalist M. Fiorentino alsoplayed a part, are matters which who so lists may investigate. The mostdangerous competitor seems to be Auguste Maquet--the "Augustus MacKeat"of the Romantic dawn--to whom some have even assigned the_Mousquetaires_[314] bodily, as far as the novel adds to the Courtils deSandras "memoirs." But even with him, and still more with the others,the good old battle-horse, which never fails one in this kind of_chevauchee_, will be found to be effective in carrying the banner ofAlexander the Greatest safe through. How does it happen that in theindependent work of none of these, nor of any others, do the _special_marks and merits of Dumas appear? How does it happen that these marksand merits appear constantly and brilliantly in all the best workassigned to Dumas, and more fitfully in almost all its vast extent?There may be a good deal of apple in some plum-jam and perhaps somevegetable-marrow. But plumminess is plumminess still, and it is theplumminess of "Dumasity" which we are here to talk of, and thatonly--the quality, not the man. And whether Dumas or Diabolus conceivedand brought it about matters, in the view of the present historian, nota _centime_. By "Dumas" is here and elsewhere--throughout this chapterand throughout this book--meant Dumasity, which is something by itself,and different from all other "-nesses and -tudes and -ties."

  [Sidenote: The positive value as fiction and as literature of the books:the less worthy works.]

  We can therefore, if we choose, betake ourselves with a joyful and quietmind to the real things--the actual characteristics of that Dumasity,Diabolicity, or _Dieu-sait-quoi_, which distinguishes (in measures anddegrees varying, perhaps essentially, certainly according to thediffering castes of readers) the great Mousquetaire trilogy; the hardlyless great collection of _La Reine Margot_ and its continuations; thelong eighteenth-century set which, in a general way, may be said to betwo-centred, having now Richelieu (the Duke, not the Cardinal) and nowCagliostro for pivot; and _Monte Cristo_--with power to add to theirnumber. In what will be said, attention will chiefly be paid to thebooks just mentioned, and perhaps a few more, such as _La_ _TulipeNoire_;
nor is even this list so closed that anybody may not considerany special favourites of his own admissible as subjects for the almostwholly unmitigated appreciation which will follow. I do not think thatDumas was ever at his best before the late sixteenth century or afterthe not quite latest eighteenth. _Isabel de Baviere_ and the _Batard deMauleon_, with others, are indeed more readable than most minorhistorical novels; but their wheels drive somewhat heavily. As for therevolutionary set, after the _Cagliostro_ interest is disposed of, somepeople, I believe, rate _Le Chevalier de Maison Rouge_ higher than I do.It is certainly better than _Les Blancs et les Bleus_ or _Les Louves deMachecoul_, in the latter of which Dumas has calmly "lifted" (or alloweda lazy "young man" to lift) the whole adventure of Rob Roy at the Fordsof Frew, pretty nearly if not quite _verbatim_.[315] Of more avowedtranslations such as _Ivanhoe_ and _Jacques Ortis_ (the latter about asmuch out of his way as anything could be), it were obviously superfluousto take detailed notice. In others the very titles, such as, forinstance, _Les Mohicans de Paris_, show at once that he is merelyimitating popular styles. Yet others, such as _Madame de Chamblay_[316](in which I cannot help thinking that the "young man" was OctaveFeuillet not yet come to his prime), have something of the ordinarynineteenth-century novel--not of the best kind.

  But in all these and many more it is simply a case of "Not here!" thoughin the historical examples, before Saint Bartholomew and afterSainte-Guillotine, the sentence may be mitigated to "Not here_consummately_." And it may be just, though only just, necessary to saythat this examination of Dumas' qualities should itself, with verylittle application or moral, settle the question whether he is a merecirculating-library caterer or a producer of real literature.

  [Sidenote: The worthier--treatment of them not so much individually asunder heads.]

  To give brief specifications of books and passages in the novelsmentioned above, in groups or individually, may seem open to theobjections often made to a mere catalogue of likes and dislikes. But,after all, in the estimation of aesthetic matters, it _is_ likes anddislikes that count. Nowhere, and perhaps in this case less thananywhere else, can the critic or the historian pretend to dispense hisreaders from actual perusal; it is sufficient, but it is at the sametime necessary, that he should prepare those who have not read andremind those who have. For champion specimen-pieces, satisfying, notmerely in parts but as wholes, the claim that Dumas shall be regarded asan absolute master in his own craft and in his own particular divisionof it, the present writer must still select, after fifty years' readingand re-reading, _Vingt Ans Apres_ and _La Reine Margot_. Parts of _LesTrois Mousquetaires_ are unsurpassed and unsurpassable; but theBonacieux love-affair is inadequate and intruded, and I have neverthought Milady's seduction of Felton quite "brought off." In _Le Vicomtede Bragelonne_ this inequality becomes much more manifest. Nothing,again, can surpass the single-handed achievement of D'Artagnan at thebeginning in his kidnapping of General Monk, and few things his failureat the end to save Porthos, with the death of the latter--a thing whichhas hardly a superior throughout the whole range of the novel inwhatever language (so far as I know) it has been written. But the "youngmen" were allowed their heads, by far too frequently and for too longperiods, in the middle;[317] and these heads were by no means alwaysequal to the occasion. There is no such declension in the immediatefollowers of _La Reine Margot_, _La Dame de Monsoreau_, and _LesQuarante-Cinq_. Chicot is supreme, but the personal interest is lessdistributed than in the first book and in the _Mousquetaire_ trilogy.

  This lack of distribution, and the inequalities of the actualadventures, are, naturally enough, more noticeable still in the longerand later series dealing with the eighteenth century, while, almost ofnecessity, the purely "romantic" interest is at a lower strength. I can,however, find very little fault with _Le Chevalier d'Harmental_--anexcellent blend of lightness and excitement. _Olympe de Cleves_ has hadvery important partisans;[318] but though I like Olympe herself almostbetter than any other of Dumas' heroines, except Marguerite, she doesnot seem to me altogether well "backed up"; and there is here, as therehad been in the _Vicomte de Bragelonne_, and was to be in others, toomuch insignificant court-intrigue. The Cagliostro cycle again appealsvery strongly to some good critics, and I own that in reading it asecond time I liked it better than I had done before. But I doubtwhether the supernatural of any kind was a circle in which Dumas couldwalk with perfect freedom and complete command of his own magic. Thereremains, as among the novels selected as pieces, not of conviction, butof diploma, _Monte Cristo_, perhaps the most popular of all, certainlyone of the most famous, and still holding its popularity with good wits.Here, again. I have to confess a certain "correction of impression." Asto the _Chateau d'If_, which is practically an independent book, therecan hardly be two opinions among competent and unprejudiced persons. ButI used to find the rest--the voluminous rest--rather heavy reading.Recently I got on better with them; but I can hardly say that they evennow stand, with me, that supreme test of a novel, "Do you want to readit again?" I once, as an experiment, read "Wandering Willie's Tale"through, every night for a week, having read it I don't know how manytimes before; and I found it no more staled at the seventh enjoymentthan I should have found the charm of Helen or of Cleopatra herself. Ido not know how many times I have read Scott's longer novels (with oneor two exceptions), or Dickens', or Thackeray's, or not a few others inFrench and English, including Dumas himself. And I hope to read them allonce, twice, or as many times more as those other Times which are inSome One's hand will let me. But I do not want to read _Monte Cristo_again.

  It will be clear from these remarks that, whether rightly or wrongly, Ithink Dumas happiest in his dealings with historical or quasi-historicalmatters, these dealings being subject to the general law, given morethan once elsewhere, that the historical personages shall not, in theirhistorically registered and detailed character, occupy the chiefpositions in the story. In other words, he seems to me to have preferredan historical canvas and a few prominent figures outlined thereon--inwhich respect he does not greatly differ from other historical novelistsso far as they are historical novelists merely. But Dumas, as a novelistof French history, had at his disposal sources and resources, forfilling up his pictures, which were lacking elsewhere, and which, inparticular, English novelists possessed hardly at all, as regardsanything earlier than the eighteenth century. I dare say it has oftenoccurred to other people, as it has to me, how vastly different _Peverilof the Peak_--one of the least satisfactory of Scott's novels--wouldhave been if Pepys's Diary had been published twenty years earlierinstead of two years later. Evelyn was available, but far less suitableto the purpose, and was only published when Scott had begun to writerather than to read.[319] For almost every year, certainly for everydecade and every notable person's life with which and with whom hewished to deal, Dumas had "Memoirs" on to which, if he did not care totake the trouble himself, he had only to turn one of the "young men" toget facts, touches, ornaments, suggestions enough for twenty times hisown huge production. Of course other people had these same stores opento them, and that other people did not make the same use thereof[320] isone of the chief glories of Alexander the Great in fiction. But in anyreal critical-historical estimate of him, the fact has to take itsplace, and its very great place.

  But there is the other fact, or collection of facts, of greaterimportance still, implied in the question, "What did he do with thesestores?" and "How did he, as it seems to Alexandrians at least, do somuch better than those other people, to whom they were open quite asfreely?"

  It is, however, before answering these questions at large, perhaps oncemore necessary to touch on what may be called the historical-_accuracy_objection. If anybody says, "The man represents Charles I. as havingbeen taken, after he had been sold by the Scotch, direct from Newcastleto London, tried at once, and executed in a day or two. This was not theway things happened"--you are bound to acknowledge his profound andrecondite historical learning. But if he goes on to say that he cannotenjoy _Vingt Ans Apres_ as a no
vel because of this, you are equallybound to pity his still more profound aesthetic ignorance and impotence.The facts, in regard to the criticism of historical novels as such,illustrate the wisdom of Scott in keeping his historical characters forthe most part in the background, and the _un_wisdom of Vigny inpreferring the opposite course. But they do nothing more. If Dumas hadchosen, he might have separated the dramatic meeting of the Four atNewcastle itself--and the intenser tale of their effort to save Charles,with its sequel of their own narrow escape from the _Eclair_ felucca--bychapters, or a book, of adventures in France. But he did not choose; andthe liberty of juxtaposition which he took is more apparently thanreally different from that which Shakespeare takes, when he jumps tenyears in _Antony and Cleopatra_. What Dumas _really_ borrows fromhistory--the tragic interest of the King's fate--is in each casehistorically true, though it is eked and adapted and manipulated to suitthe fictitious interest of the Quadrilateral. You certainly could not,then or now, _ride_ from Windsor to London in twenty minutes, though youcould now motor the distance in the time, at the risk of considerablefines. And an Englishman, jealous of his country's honour, might urgethat, while the "Vin _de Porto_" itself came in rather later, there werefew places in the England of the seventeenth century where that "Vin_d'Espagne_," so dear to Athos, was not more common than it was inFrance, though one would not venture to deny that the shortly-to-becomeBaron de Bracieux _had_ some genuine Xeres (as we are told) in hiscellar. But these things are--no more and no less than the greaterones--utter trifles as far as the actual novel interest is concerned.They are, indeed, less than trifles: they can hardly be said to exist.

  [Sidenote: His attitude to Plot.]

  The "four wheels of the novel" have been sometimes, and perhaps rightly,said to be Plot, Character, Description, and Dialogue--Style[321] beinga sort of fifth. Of the first there is some difficulty in speaking,because the word "plot" is by no means used, as the text-books say,"univocally," and its synonyms or quasi-synonyms, in the differentusages, are themselves things "kittle" to deal with. "Action" issometimes taken as one of these synonyms--certainly in some senses ofaction no novelist has ever had more; very few have had so much. But ofconcerted, planned, or strictly co-ordinated action, of more thanepisode character, he can hardly be said to have been anything like amaster. His best novels are chronicle-plays undramatised--large numbersof his scenes could be cut out with as little real loss as foolish"classical" critics used to think to be the case with Shakespeare; andhis connections, when he takes the trouble to make any, are often hisvery weakest points. Take, for instance, the things that bring aboutD'Artagnan's great quest for the diamonds--one of the most excellentepisodes in this department of fiction, and something more than anepisode in itself. The author actually cannot think of any better waythan to make Constance Bonacieux--who is represented as a ratherunusually intelligent woman, well acquainted with her husband'scharacter, and certainly not likely to overestimate him through anysuperabundance of wifely affection or admiration--propose that he, amiddle-aged mercer of sedentary and _bourgeois_ habits, shall undertakean expedition which, on the face of it, requires youth, strength,audacity, presence of mind, and other exceptional qualities in noordinary measure, and which, if betrayed to an ever vigilant, extremelypowerful, and quite unscrupulous enemy, is almost certain to befrustrated.

  Still the "chronicle"-action dispenses a man, to a large extent, in theeyes of some readers at any rate, from even attempting exact and tight_liaisons_ of scene in this fashion, though of course if he does attemptthem he submits himself to the perils of his attempt just as his heroessubmit themselves to theirs. But other readers--and perhaps all thosepredestined to be Alexandrians--do not care to exact the penalties forsuch a failure. They are quite content to find themselves launched onthe next reach of the stream, without asking too narrowly whether theyhave been ushered decorously through a lock or have tumbled somehow overa lasher. Such troubles never drown or damage _them_. And indeed thereare some of them sufficiently depraved by nature, and hardened byindulgence in sin, to disregard _general_ action altogether, and to lookmainly if not wholly to the way in which the individual stories aretold, not at that in which they come to have to be told. Of Dumas' powerof telling a story there surely can be no two opinions. The veryreproach of _amuseur_ confesses it. Of the means--or some of them--bywhich he does and does not exercise this power, more may be said underthe heads which follow. We are here chiefly concerned with the power asit has been achieved and stands--in, for instance, such a thing, alreadyglanced at, as the "Vin de Porto" episode or division of _Vingt AnsApres_, which, though there are scores of others nearly as good, seemsto me on the whole the very finest thing Dumas ever did in his ownpeculiar kind. There are just two dozen pages of it--pages very wellfilled--from the moment when Blaisois and Mousqueton express their ideason the subject of the unsuitableness of beer, as a fortifier againstsea-sickness, to that when the corpse of Mordaunt, after floating in themoonlight with the gold-hilted dagger flashing from its breast, sinksfor the last time. The interest grows constantly; it is never, as itsometimes is elsewhere, watered out by too much talk, though there isenough of this to carry out the author's usual system (_v. inf._).Nothing happens sufficiently extravagant or improbable to excite disgustor laughter, though what does happen is sufficiently "palpitating." Ifthis is melodrama, it is melodrama free from most of the objections madeelsewhere to the kind. And also if it is melodrama, it seems to me to bemelodrama infinitely superior, not merely in degree, but in kind, tothat of Sue and Soulie.

  [Sidenote: To Character.]

  It is in this "enfisting" power of narrative, constantly renewed if notalways logically sustained and connected, that Dumas' excellence, if nothis actual supremacy, lies; and the fact may dispense us from saying anymore about his plots. As to Character, we must still keep theoffensive-defensive line. Dumas' most formidable enemies--persons likethe late M. Brunetiere--would probably say that he has no character atall. Some of his champions would content themselves with ejaculatingthe two names "D'Artagnan!" and "Chicot!" shrugging their shoulders, andabstaining from further argument as likely to be useless, there being nocommon ground to argue upon. In actual life this might not be the mostirrational manner of proceeding; but it could hardly suffice here. As isusually, if not invariably, the case, the difference of estimate _is_traceable, in the long run, to the fact that the disputants oradversaries are not using words in the same sense--working inconjunction with the other fact that they do not like and want the samethings. Almost all words are ambiguous, owing to the length of timeduring which they have been used and the variety of parts they have beenmade to play. But there are probably few which--without being absolutelyequivocal like "box" and our other "foreigners' horrors"--require theuse of the _distinguo_ more than "character." As applied to novels, itmay mean (1) a human personality more or less deeply analysed; (2) onevividly distinguished from others; (3) one which is made essentially_alive_ and almost recognised as a real person; (4) a "personage"ticketed with some marks of distinction and furnished with a dramatic"part"; (5) an eccentric. The fourth and fifth may be neglected here. Itis in relation to the other three that we have to consider Dumas as acharacter-monger.

  In the competition for representation of character which depends uponanalysis, "psychology," "problem-projection," Dumas is of coursenowhere, though, to the disgust of some and the amusement of others,_Jacques Ortis_ figures in the list of his works. _Rene_, _Adolphe_, theworks of Madame de Stael (if they are to be admitted) and those of Beyle(which no doubt must be) found nothing corresponding in his nature; andthere was not the slightest reason why they should. The cellar of thenovel contains even more than the "thousand dozen of wine" enshrined bythat of Crotchet Castle, but no intelligent possessor of it, any morethan Mr. Crotchet himself, would dream of restricting it to one kind ofvintage. Nor, probably, would any really intelligent possessor arrangehis largest bins for this kind, which at its best is a very exquisite_vin de liqueur_, but which few people wish to drink c
onstantly; andwhich at its worst, or even in mediocre condition, is very poortipple--"shilpit," as Peter Peebles most unjustly characterises sherryin _Redgauntlet_. Skipping (2) for the moment, I do not know that underhead (3) one can make much fight for Alexander. D'Artagnan and Chicotare doubtless great, and many others fall not far short of them. I amalways glad to meet these two in literature, and should be glad to meetthem in real life, particularly if they were on my side, though theirbeing on the other would add considerably to the excitement of one'sexistence--so long as it continued. But I am not sure that I _know_ themas I know Marianne and Des Grieux, Tom Jones and My Uncle Toby, theBaron of Bradwardine and Elizabeth Bennet. Athos I know or should knowif I met him, which I am sorry to say I have not yet done; and La ReineMargot, and possibly Olympe de Cleves; but there is more guess-workabout the knowledge with her than in the other cases. Porthos (orsomebody very like him) I did know, and he was most agreeable; but hedied too soon to go into the army, as he ought to have done, afterleaving Oxford. And though I never met a complete Aramis, I think I havemet him in parts. There are not many more of this class. On the otherhand, there is almost an entire absence in Dumas of those merelay-figures which are so common in other novelists. There is greatplenty of something more than toy-theatre characters cut out well andbrightly painted, fit to push across the stage and justify their "words"and vanish; but that is a different thing.

  And this leads us partly back and partly up to the second head, theprovision of characters sufficiently distinguished from others, and socapable of playing their parts effectually and interestingly. It is inthis that he is so good, and it is this which distinguishes himself fromall his fellows but the very greatest. D'Artagnan and Chicot are againthe best; but how good, at least in the better books, are almost all theothers! D'Artagnan would be a frightful loss, but suppose he were notthere and you knew nothing about him, would you not think Planchetsomething of a prize? Without Chicot there would be a blank horrible tothink of. But do we not still "share"? Have we not Dom Gorenflot?

  It is in this provision of vivid and sufficiently, if not absolutely,vivified characters and personages--"company" for his narrativedramas--that Dumas is so admirable under this particular head. If theyare rarely detachable or independent, they work out the businessconsummately. Lackeys and ladies' maids, inn-keepers and casual guestsat inns, courtiers and lawyers, noblemen and "lower classes," they alldo what they ought to do; they all "answer the ends of their beingcreated,"--which is to carry out and on, through two or three or half adozen volumes, a blissful suspension from the base realities ofexistence. And if anybody asks of them more than this, it is his ownfault, and a very great fault too.[322]

  [Sidenote: To Description (and "style").]

  Of Description, as of the "fifth wheel" style, there is little to sayabout Dumas, though the littleness is in neither respect damaging. Theyare both adequate to the situation and the composition. Can you say muchmore of him or of anybody? If it were worth while to go into detail atall, this adequacy could be made out, I think, a good deal more thansufficiently. Take one of his greatest things, the "BastionSaint-Gervais" in the _Mousquetaires_. If he has not made you see theheroic hopeless town, and the French leaguer and the shattered redoubtbetween, and the forlorn hope of the Four foolhardy yet forethoughtfuland for ever delightful heroes, with their not so cheerful followers,eating, drinking, firing, consulting, and flaunting the immortalnapkin-pennant in the enemy's face--you would not be made to see it,though the authors of _Ines de las Sierras_ or of _Le Chateau de laMisere_ had given you a cast of their office. And, what is more, themethod of _Ines de las Sierras_ and of _Le Chateau de la Misere_ wouldhave been actually out of place. It would have got in the way of thebusiness, the engrossing business, of the manual fight against theRochellois, and the spiritual fight against Richelieu and Rochefort andMilady. So, again--so almost tautologically--with "style" in the morecomplicated and elaborate sense of the word. One may here once morethank Emile de Girardin for the phrase that he used of Gautier's ownstyle in _feuilleton_ attempts. It _would_ be _genant pourl'abonne_--even for an _abonne_ who was not the first comer. It is notthe beautiful phrase, over which you can linger, that is required, butthe straightforward competent word-vehicle that carries you on throughthe business, that you want in such work. The essence of Dumas' qualityis to find or make his readers thirsty, and to supply their thirst. Youcan't quench thirst with _liqueurs_; if you are not a Philistine youwill not quench it with vintage port or claret, with Chateau Yquem, oreven with fifteen-year-old Clicquot. A "long" whisky and potash, abottle of sound Medoc, or, best of all, a pewter quart of not too smallor too strong beer--these are the modest but sufficient quenchers thatsuit the case. And Dumas gives you just the equivalents of these.

  [Sidenote: To Conversation.]

  But it may seem that, for the last head or two, the defence has been alittle "let down"--the pass, if not "sold," somewhat weakly held.[323]No such half-heartedness shall be chargeable on what is going to be saidunder the last category, which, in a way, allies itself to the first. Itis, to a very large extent, by his marvellous use of conversation thatDumas attains his actual mastery of story-telling; and so thischaracteristic of his is of double importance and requires a Benjamin'sallowance of treatment. The name just used is indeed speciallyappropriate, because Conversation is actually the youngest of thenovelist's family or staff of work-fellows. We have seen, throughout ornearly throughout the last volume, how very long it was before itspowers and advantages were properly appreciated; how mere _recit_dominated fiction; and how, when the personages were allowed to speak,they were for the most part furnished only or mainly withharangues--like those with which the "unmixed" historian used to endowhis characters. That conversation is not merely a grand set-off to astory, but that it is an actual means of telling the story itself, seemsto have been unconscionably and almost unintelligibly slow in occurringto men's minds; though in the actual story-telling of ordinary life byword of mouth it is, and always must have been, frequent enough.[324] Itis not impossible that the derivation of prose from verse fiction mayhave had something to do with this, for gossippy talk and epic orromance in verse do not go well together. Nor is it probable that theold, the respectable, but the too often mischievous disinclination to"mix kinds" may have had its way, telling men that talk was thedramatist's not the novelist's business. But whatever was the cause,there can be no dispute about the fact.

  It was, it should be hardly necessary to say, Scott who first discoveredthe secret[325] to an effectual extent, though he was not always true tohis own discovery. And it is not superfluous to note that it was aspecially valuable and important discovery in regard to the novel ofhistorical adventure. It had, of course, and almost necessarily, forceditself, in regard to the novel of ordinary life, upon our own greatexplorers in that line earlier. Richardson has it abundantly. But whenyou are borrowing the _subjects_ of the historian, what can be morenatural than to succumb to the _methods_ of the historian--the longcontinuous narrative and the intercalated harangue? It must be donesometimes; there is a danger of its being done too often. Before he hadfound out the true secret, Scott blunted the opening of _Waverley_ with_recit_; after he had discovered it he relapsed in divers places, ofwhich the opening of _The Monastery_ may suffice for mention here. Dumashimself (and it will be at once evident that this is a main danger of"turning on your young man") has done it often--to take once more asingle example, there is too much of it in the account of the great_emeute_, by which Gondy started the Fronde. But it is the facilitywhich he has of dispensing with it--of making the story speak itself,with only barely necessary additions of the pointer and reciter at theside of the stage--which constitutes his power. Instances can hardly berequired, for any one who knows him knows them, and every one who goesto him, not knowing, will find them. Just to touch the _apices_ oncemore, the two scenes following the actual overtures of the_Mousquetaires_ and of _La Reine Margot_--that where the impossibletriple duel of D'Artagnan against the Three is tur
ned into triumphantbattle with the Cardinalists, blood-cementing the friendship of theFour; and that where Margot, after losing both husband and lover, issupplied with a substitute for both; adding the later passage where LaMole is saved from the noose at the door--may suffice.

  Of course this device of conversation, like the other best things--thebeauty of woman, the strength of wine, the sharpness of steel, and redink--is "open to abuse."[326] It has been admitted that even thefervency of the present writer's Alexandrianism cools at the "wall-game"of Montalais and Malicorne. There may be some who are not even preparedto like it in places where I do. They are like Porthos, in the greatinitial interchange of compliments, and "would still be _doing_." Butsurely they cannot complain of any lack of incident in this latest andnot least _Alexandreid_?

  It may seem that the length of this chapter is not proportionate to themagnitude of the claims advanced for Dumas. But, as in other cases, Ithink it may not be impertinent to put in a reference to what I havepreviously written elsewhere. Moreover, as, but much more than, in thecases of Sandeau, Bernard, and Murger, there is an argument, paradoxicalin appearance merely, for the absence of prolixity.

  His claim to greatness consists, perhaps primarily, in the simplicity,straightforwardness, and general human interest of his appeal. He wantsno commentaries, no introductions, no keys, no dismal Transactions ofDumas Societies and the like. Every one that thirsteth may come to hisfountain and drink, without mysteries of initiation, or formalities oflicence, or concomitant nuisances of superintendence and regulation. Inthe _Camp of Refuge_ of Charles Macfarlane (who has recently, in an oddway, been recalled to passing knowledge)--a full and gallant private inthe corps of which Dumas himself was then colonel _vice_ Sir Walterdeceased--there is a sentence which applies admirably to Dumas himself.After a success over the other half of our ancestors, and during asupper on the conquered provant, one of the Anglo-Saxon-half observes,"Let us leave off talking, and be jolly." Nothing could please me betterthan that some reader should be instigated to leave off my book at thispoint, and take up _Les Trois Mousquetaires_ or _Les Quarante-Cinq_, orif he prefers it, _Olympe de Cleves_--"and be jolly".[327]

  FOOTNOTES:

  [311] The postponement of him, to this last chapter of the firstdivision of the book, was determined on chiefly because his _novels_were not begun at all till years after the other greater novelists,already dealt with, had made their reputation, while the greatest ofthem--the "Mousquetaire" and "Henri Trois" cycles--did not appear tillthe very last _lustrum_ of the half-century. But another--it may seem tosome a childish--consideration had some weight with me. I wished torange father and son on either side of the dividing summary; for thoughthe elder wrote long after 1850 and the younger some time before it, inhardly any pair is the opposition of the earlier and later times moreclearly exposed; and the identity of name emphasises the difference ofnature.

  [312] In using this phrase I remembered the very neat "score" made offthe great Alexander himself by a French judge, in some case at Rouenwhere Dumas was a witness. Asked as usual his occupation, he repliedsomewhat grandiloquently: "Monsieur, si je n'etais pas dans la ville deCorneille, je dirais 'Auteur dramatique.'" "Mais, Monsieur," replied theofficial with the sweetest indulgence, "il y a des degres." (This storyis told, like most such, with variants; and sometimes, as in theparticular case was sure to happen, not of Alexander the father, but ofAlexander the son. But I tell it, as I read or heard it, long yearsago.)

  [313] You may possibly do as an English novelist of the privileged sexis said to have done, and write novels while people are calling on youand you are talking to them (though I should myself consider it badmanners, and the novels would certainly bear traces of the exploit). Butyou can hardly do it while, as a famous caricature represents the scene,persons of that same sex, in various dress or undress, are frolickingabout your chair and bestowing on you their obliging caresses. Nor arecorricolos and speronares, though they may be good things to write on inone sense, good in another to write in.

  [314] As far as I know Maquet, his line seems to me to have been dramarather than fiction.

  [315] I seem to remember somebody (I rather think it was Henley, and itwas very likely to be) attempting a defence of this. But, except _pourrire_, such a thing is hopeless.

  [316] I think (but it is a long time since I read the book) that it isthe heroine of this who, supposed to be a dead, escapes from "thatgrewsome thing, premature interment" (as Sandy Mackay justly calls it),because of the remarkable odour of _violettes de Parme_ which herunspotted flesh evolves from the actual grave.

  [317] I do not mind Montalais, but I object to Malicozne both in himselfand as her lover. Mlle. de la Valliere and the plots against her virtuegive us "pious Selinda" at unconscionable length, and, but that it wouldhave annoyed Athos, I rather wish M. le Vicomte de la Bragelonne himselfhad come to an end sooner.

  [318] My friend Mr. Henley, I believe, ranked it very high, and so did acommon friend of his and mine, the late universally regretted Mr. GeorgeWyndham. It so happened that, by accident, I never read the book till afew years ago; and Mr. Wyndham saw it, fresh from the bookseller's anduncut (or technically, "unopened") in my study. I told him thecircumstances, and he said, in his enthusiastic way, "I _do_ envy you!"

  [319] I do not need to be reminded of the conditions of health that alsoaffected _Peveril_.

  [320] I need not repeat, but merely refer to, what I have said of_Cinq-Mars_ and of _Notre-Dame de Paris_.

  [321] On the very day on which I was going over the rough draft of thispassage I saw, in a newspaper of repute, some words which perhaps throwlight on the objection to Dumas as having no literary merit. In them"incident, coherence, humour, and dramatic power" were all excluded fromthis merit, "style" alone remaining. Now I have been almost as oftenreproved for attaching too much value to style in others as forattending too little to it myself. But I certainly could not give itsuch a right to "reign alone." It will indeed "do" almost by itself; butother things can "do" almost without it.

  [322] To be absolutely candid, Dumas himself did sometimes ask more ofthem than they could do; and then he failed. There can, I think, belittle doubt that this is the secret of the inadequacy (as at least itseems to me) of the Felton episode. As a friend (whose thousand meritsstrive to cover his one crime of not admiring Dumas quite enough), notknowing that I had yet written a line of this chapter, but as ithappened just as I had reached the present point, wrote to me: "Thinkwhat Sir Walter would have made of Felton!"

  [323] I could myself be perfectly content to adapt George III. on acertain _Apology_, and substitute for all this a simple "I do not thinkDumas needs any defence." But where there has been so much obloquy,there should, perhaps, be some refutation.

  [324] "And then he says, says he...."

  [325] In modern novels, of course. You have some good talk in Homer andalso in the Sagas, but I am not thinking or speaking of them.

  [326]

  "Red ink for ornament and black for use-- The best of things are open to abuse."

  (_The Good Clerk_ as vouched for by Charles Lamb.)

  [327] Yet, being nothing if not critical, I can hardly agree with thosewho talk of Dumas' "_wild_ imagination"! As the great Mr. Wordsworth wasmore often made to mourn by the gratitude of men than by its opposite,so I, in my humbler sphere, am more cast down sometimes by inappositepraise than by ignorant blame.