The History of Fiction

THE former Edition of this work has been for some time out of print, and, in consequence of the suggestions of numerous persons, the Publishers have reproduced it in a condensed form, in order to render the information and entertainment contained in its pages accessible at a moderate cost.

LONDON, April 1845.

ΤΟ

THE SECOND EDITION.

WHEN two volumes of the following work or a return of all the giants who were slain were printed, and most part of the third sent by Amadis or Esplandian, on the coast of to the press, I received the 26th Number of Ethiopia.

the Quarterly Review, containing a criticism

Although I am by no means desirous to on the first edition of the History of Fiction. be considered of the number of those who In the present edition I flatter myself I have" speken" with irreverence

“

Of men that romances rede
Of Keveloke, Horn, and of Wade,

greatly improved the book, partly by adding a variety of new articles-partly by a more exact analysis of some rare productions, of which I had formerly been unable to obtain a nevertheless, I cannot help remarking an unperusal, and concerning which I was therefore lucky peculiarity which takes place in the obliged to trust to secondary sources. It is republic of black letters, and which may be not impossible, however, that those who can-set down as a salutary caution to those who didly admit that they engage in the charitable presume to venture into that region. In most " employment of groping about for flaws and other districts of literature, the possession of a blemishes" (Quart. Review, p. 406), may still book is not supposed to confer, like an amulet, discover or make some of their Dulcia Vitia. any supernatural skill on its owner; nor does I certainly do not yet pretend to have visited a person, for example, who is so lucky as to "all the ancient and secluded regions of ro- have a copy of the Eneid, suppose himself mance," by which, I suppose, is meant every qualified, from this sole circumstance, to write "lumber-house of books" in the country, but a critique on epic poetry, or a review of Rohave myself taken considerable pains, and (as man literature. The case is different in the some possessors of old romances will probably republic to which I have alluded. There, if allow) have given considerable trouble to a person chance to light on a few leaves, which others on the subject. In professing, how-were in former times

Redeemed from tapers and defrauded pies,

ever, to exhibit an accurate analysis of the chief prose works of fiction, I certainly would not be understood to mean, that the work is he immediately sets up as an adept, and is so minutely exact, as to contain a muster-roll even by his brethren acknowledged as such, of all the knights who fought with Lancelot, though all the information he has to bestow,

The classics of an age that heard of none;

bush, is also the interpretation of the editors of the Bibliotheque des Romans, who, whatever may be their faults in other respects, at least understood French as well as the reviewer, and

is, of how many pages or lines his fragment tower. "La Damoyselle fist ung cerne autour consists. It matters not how perfectly unim- du buysson et entour Merlin, &c., et quant il portant may be this fragment of s'esveilla luy fut advis qu'il estoit enclos en la plus forte tour du monde." This phrase, luy fut advis, is the one constantly used in and those who have not learned how many romance, to express the delusions of enchantlines, half lines, capital letters, and blank ment. Thus, when Perceforest mistakes the pages it contains, are regarded as no more magician Darnant for his wife Idorus, when "entitled to courtesy than the Hermanticor❘ the sorcerer had assumed her appearance, it is of the Heafrates." said, "Lors dresse l'espée pour luy coupper The author of the critique in the Quarterly la tete, et le prent par les cheveulx, et le vouReview, after begging leave to shut his eyes lut ferir; mais il luy fut advis qu'il tenoit la on paganism (by which is meant the romances plus belle damoiselle que oncques veit par les written by the Bishop of Tricca and others, cheveulx." That Merlin was enclosed in a during the reigns of the christian and orthodox emperors of Constantinople), proceeds to compare himself and his coadjutors to the "Seven Sleepers of Ephesus" (Quart. Review, p. 386). And sorry I am to observe, that who, in their account of Merlin, say, “Messire (unless the critic procured only a fragment of my work) sleeping he must have been, or he could not have made the following observation:-" Mr Dunlop has confined himself to the French romances relating to Arthur and Charlemagne; but it would have been advisable to include in a History of Fiction an account of such of the ancient romances, as, though irreducible to either of these classes, are valuable from their intrinsic merit or literary relationship." (P. 395.) Now, so far from confining myself to romances relating to Arthur and Charlemagne, I have devoted nearly half a volume, both in the present and former edition, to Amadis and his descendants, and to those romances of which classical or mythological characters are the heroes.

Gauvain et autres chevaliers se mirent en marche pour le (Merlin) chercher en differentes contrées, mais ce fut inutilement, et sa voix seule fut entendue dans la foret de Broceliande, ou Messire Gauvain le trouvoit enclos, arreté et invisible, a l'ombre d'un bois d' aubepine par le moyen d' un charme," &c.

But I have much better authority to produce on this subject, than either my own or that of the authors of the Bibliotheque des Romans. In the romance of Ysaie le Triste, the fairy Glorianda, whose credibility on this point cannot be called in question, depones to the confinement of Merlin in a tree. She and other fairies, protectresses of Ysaie, having in formed the hermit, by whom the child of Tristan was brought up, of the demise of his The same slumber which closed his eyes on parents, the recluse, who was not aware of the this part of the work, has exhibited to the quality of his guests, presumes to ask their Reviewer a tower in the romance of Merlin, authority for these melancholy tidings. "Il where no tower existed. He has attributed n'y a gueres," replies the eldest of their numto me an inaccuracy, in stating that the en- ber, "que nous estions en la Grande Bretaigne, chanter was enclosed in a bush instead of a en un bois que l'on appelle la forest d' Avatower; but any person who reads the passage, ritez; et environ au meilleu a le plus bel will see that he was in reality enclosed in the arbre que oncques vissiez, dessoubz lequel bush, but that, by the force of magic, it ap- Merlin est enfermé par l' engin de la Dame du peared to him that he was shut up in a strong Lac: nè jamais ne bougera tant que le siecle

durera. Or avons accoustume que quand nous threads of curling gold." It is indeed difallons jouer par la forest voluntiers nous y re-ficult to know how to proceed, since it appears, posons, et parlons a icelluy Merlin; et il nous from the same CRITIQUE, that gravity is equally respond: Là nous divisons, aucunes fois toute la nuit entiere." (L'Histoire de Isaie le Triste, c. iii.) So much for the belief of the reviewer that Merlin inhabits an aerial garret of the highest tower in the universe!

fatal to romantic topics, and equally to be avoided as levity: We are there informed of the melancholy fact, That the "last legend of Wade has missed us, in consequence of the provoking gravity of Speght and Kynaston, who Nor need the reviewer "admire the caprice have left untold the wonderful birth of Wade, which induced Mr Dunlop to confine himself or Vade, the son of King Vilkinus and the to little more than a meagre outline of the Sea Quean!" (P. 397.) I share all the critic's life of the prophet" (p. 394); for, though one indignation at this hystorie, which I doubt of the most curious romances of the class not would have been right pleasaunt and deto which it belongs, "the Book of Merlin lectable to rede, having missed us; and proexactly corresponds," as the reviewer well mise, on my own part, to assume the proper remarks," with the metrical romance so ably analyzed by Mr Ellis," and of course is already known to the English reader in a form more agreeable than I could pretend to exhibit it. A similar caprice has induced me to "confine myself to little more than a meagre outline" of the romance of Amadis de Gaul, though one of the most curious of the class to which it belongs," because it has recently been faithfully and ably translated by Mr Southey.

solemnity, whenever a graduated and accredited scale is published for that purpose.

There is, however, one important charge made in the critique, and on which I shall be as serious as the reviewer chuses. It is said, that in stating the machinery of early romance to be rather of classical than oriental origin, I have concealed that the honour of this discovery is due to Mr Southey; and the charge is so worded as ingeniously to imply that I wished to appropriate the hypothesis to myThe mention of Amadis de Gaul reminds self. (P. 390.) Now, in the first place, in inme of another heavy charge-that I have not troducing this subject I have said, "A fourth treated the romances of chivalry in a manner hypothesis has been suggested, which represufficiently serious, and have even presumed sents the machinery and colouring of fiction, to sneer at the society I have chosen. (P.408.) the stories of enchanted gardens, &c., which Now certainly I did not think it necessary to contemplate the exploits of chivalry with the gravity of Ysaie le Triste, or the productions in which they are detailed, with the sad and sorrowful solemnity of the Knight of the Woful Countenance. Had I used the privilege recommended to me by the reviewer,

have been introduced into romance, as derived from classical and mythological authors." (Hist. of Fic. vol. i. p. 540, 1st ed.-p. 167, 2d ed.) In the next place, I have said that Mr Ritson had successively ridiculed the Gothic, Arabian, and classical systems-an observation which, whether correct or not as to Ritson, shows at least that I had no design of appropriating the credit of the hypothesis to myself. "Mr Ritson," says the Review, "could I fear I should be considered as having fallen not well ridicule this classical system, since, as into the phrensy of him who discovered a it happens, it had not then been promulgated.” beautiful infanta in the coarse skin of Mari- (P. 390.) If, by not being promulgated, the tornes, and "mistook her hair, which was critic means that it was not inserted in the rough as a horse's mane, for soft flowing Acts of Parliament, he is more correct than

Nominibus mollire licet mala; fusca vocetur
Nigrior Illyricá cui pice sanguis erit,

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