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retainers, and haunted by most active, ubiquitous, and altogether 
ineffectual ghosts. There is a good deal of soft music in the air, 
and a good deal of murder done on ¢rra firma, and there is a 
great deal of descriptive writing about fine scenery which Mrs. 
Radcliffe had seen in her travels and had evidently thoroughly 
enjoyed and appreciated. Let me, in order to illustrate the 
difference between what is sometimes called “fine writing,” and 
the artistic simplicity of a master hand, read the concluding lines 
of the “Mysteries of Udolpho” and the “Vicar of Wakefield” 
respectively. 
In “Udolpho,” the heroine has been married to the hero and 
duly endowed with castles and estates ; every reputable character 
in the book has been amply provided for, and every disreputable 
person has been killed or otherwise put out of the way. The 
peroration follows :— 
“‘Oh! how joyful it is to tell of happiness such as that of Valancourt and 
Emily ; to relate that, after suffering under the oppression of the vicious and 
the disdain of the weak, they were at length restored to each other—to the 
beloved landscapes of their native country—to the securest felicity of this life, 
that of aspiring for moral and labouring for intellectual improvement—to the 
pleasures of enlightened society, and to the exercise of the benevolence which 
had always animated their hearts ; while the bowers of La Vallie became once 
more the retreat of goodness, wisdom, and domestic blessedness ! 
“Oh! useful may it be to have shewn that though the vicious may sometimes 
pour affliction upon the good, their power is transient and their punishment 
certain ; and that innocence, though oppressed by injustice, shall, supported by 
patience, finally triumph over misfortune ! 
“And if the weak hand that has recorded this tale has by its scenes beguiled 
the mourner of one hour of sorrow, or, by its moral, taught him to sustain it— 
the effort, however humble, has not been in vain, nor is the writer unrewarded,” 
It is like the “tag” at the end of an old-fashioned comedy, 
where the players being all assembled in couples before the foot- 
lights, the principal gentleman delivers himself of a ponderous 
moral sentiment, and then the principal lady steps forward and 
says, “And if only we have succeeded in amusing our kind 
friends,” etc. 
How much more simple and natural, and yet how much more 
