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keen flashes of wit, alternately gay and pathetic, it displayed the same subtle perception of character, and condensed vigor of expression, which distinguish Thackeray among most, shall we not say all, modern writers of fiction. No report can do anything like justice to the numerous felicities of the lecture.

[The subsequent notices were generally laudatory, although in the report of the last lecture in the Tribune for Dec. 7, we find the following:

"The hour for commencing being 8 o'clock, Mr. Thackeray appeared punctually at eighteen minutes past the time, and proceeded with his lecture."

At the close of this last lecture, resolutions of appreciation were voted by the audience.]

From Fraser's Magazine, January, 1853.*

MR. THACKERAY IN THE UNITED STATES.

To the Editor of Fraser's Magazine:

You may remember, my dear sir, how I prognosticated a warm reception for your Mr. Michael Angelo Titmarsh in New York-how I advised that he should come by a Collins rather than a Cunard liner-how that he must land at New York rather than at Boston -or at any rate, that he mustn't dare to begin lecturing at the latter city, and bring cold joints' to the former one. In the last particular he has happily followed my suggestion, and has opened with a warm

* This burlesque article was signed "John Small," but it was immediately recognised as Thackeray's own work.

success in the chief city. The journals have been full of him. On the 19th of November, he commenced his lectures before the Mercantile Library Association (young ardent commercialists), in the spacious New York Church belonging to the flock presided over by the Rev. Mr. Chapine; a strong row of ladies-the cream of the capital—and an unusual number of the distinguished literary and professional celebrities.' The critic of the New York Tribune is forward to commend his style of delivery as 'that of a well-bred gentleman, reading with marked force and propriety to a large circle in the drawing-room.' So far, excellent. This witness is a gentleman of the press, and is a credit to his order. But there are some others who have whetted the ordinary American appetite of inquisitiveness with astounding intelligence.

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You cannot help perceiving that the lion in America is public property and confiscate to the public weal. They trim the creature's nails, they cut the hair off his mane and tail (which is distributed or sold to his admirers), and they draw his teeth, which are frequently preserved with much the same care as you keep any memorable grinder whose presence has been agony, and departure delight.

Bear leading is not so in vogue across the Atlantic as at your home in England; but lion leading is infinitely more in fashion.

Some learned man is appointed Androcles to the new arrival. One of the familiars of the press is despatched to attend to the latest attraction, and by

this reflecting medium the lion is perpetually presented to the popular gaze. The guest's most secret self is exposed by his host. Every action-every word-every gesture is preserved and proclaimed-a sigh-a noda groan-a sneeze-a cough—or a wink-is each written down by this recording minister, who blots out nothing. No tabula rasa with him. The portrait is limned with the fidelity of Parrhasius, and filled up with the minuteness of the Daguerre process itself. No blood-hound or Bow-street officer can be keener, or more exact on the trail than this irresistible and unavoidable spy. 'Tis in Austria they calotype criminals in the far West the public press prints the identity of each notorious visitor to its shores.

In turn Mr. Dickens, Lord Carlisle, Jenny Lind, and now Mr. Thackeray, have been lionized in America.

They go to see, themselves a greater sight than all.

[Thackeray may have felt that this article would cause some irritation; he therefore closed it with a graceful tribute to American hospitality, reprinted from the concluding remarks of his last lecture in New York, Dec. 6, 1852. Curiously enough, in alluding to this lecture, he gave the date as Dec. 7, a mistake in which he is followed by Mr. Melville, Life, I. 297.]

From Putnam's Magazine, June, 1853.

THACKERAY IN AMERICA.

Mr. Thackeray's visit at least demonstrated, that if we are unwilling to pay English authors for their books, we are ready to reward them handsomely for the oppor

tunity of seeing and hearing them. If Mr. Dickens, instead of dining at other people's expense, and making speeches at his own, when he came to see us, had devoted an evening or two in the week to lecturing, his purse would have been fuller, his feelings sweeter, and his fame fairer. It was a Quixotic crusade, that of the Copyright, and the excellent Don has never forgiven the windmill that broke his spear.

Undoubtedly, when it was ascertained that Mr. Thackeray was coming, the public feeling on our side. of the sea was very much divided as to his probable reception. "He'll come and humbug us, eat our dinners, pocket our money, and go home and abuse us, like that unmitigated snob Dickens," said Jonathan, chafing with the remembrance of that grand ball at the Park Theatre, and the Boz tableaux, and the universal wining and dining, to which the distinguished Dickens was subject while he was our guest.

'Let him have his say," said others, “and we will have our look. We will pay a dollar to hear him, if we can see him at the same time; and as for the abuse, why it takes even more than two such cubs of the roaring British lion to frighten the American eagle. Let him come, and give him fair play."

He did come, and has had his fair play, and has returned to England with a comfortable pot of gold holding $12,000, and with the hope and promise of seeing us again in September, to discourse of something not less entertaining than the witty men and sparkling times of Anne. We think there was no disappointment with his lectures. Those who knew his books found

the author in the lecturer. Those who did not know the books were charmed in the lecturer by what is charming in the author, the unaffected humanity, the tenderness, the sweetness, the genial play of fancy, and the sad touch of truth, with that glancing stroke of satire, which, lightning-like, illumines while it withers. The lectures were even more delightful than the books, because the tones of the voice, and the appearance of the man, the general personal magnetism, explained and alleviated so much that would otherwise have seemed doubtful or unfair. For those who had long felt in the writings of Thackeray a reality, quite inexpressible, there was a secret delight in finding it justified by his speaking. For he speaks as he writes, simply, directly, without flourish, without any cant of oratory, commending what he says by its intrinsic sense, and the sympathetic, and humane way in which it was spoken. Thackeray is the kind of "stump-orator"' that would have pleased Carlyle. He never thrusts himself between you and his thought. If his conception of the time and his estimate of the men differ from your own, you have at least no doubt what his view is, nor how sincere and necessary it is to him. Mr. Thackeray considers Swift a misanthrope. He loves Goldsmith, and Steele, and Harry Fielding. He has no love for Sterne, great admiration for Pope, and alleviated admiration for Addison. How could it be otherwise? How could Thackeray not think Swift a misanthrope, and Sterne a factitious sentimentalist? He is a man of instincts, not of thoughts. He sees and feels. He would be "Shakspeare's call-boy"

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