160 Fashionable Novels. [ Ave. 
However, let his obscurity be as profound as it might, he soon became 
conspicuous. Murray, the bookseller, probably anxious to get rid of 
some of his superfluity, listened to the advice of this rising genitis, and 
the result of this exquisite wisdom was the starting of the “ Representa- 
tive;” Mr. D’Israeli, jun. proposing himself as the editor, and promising, 
in his first gssay, to astonish the stupid world with superfine writing, 
«wit nurtured by champagne,” and elegance communicated by nothing 
less than the soul of dandyism. What this elegant could make of the 
unfortunate Representative was discovered in two days, and might have 
been discoverable in two minutes; what he made of unfortunate John 
Murray, the bookseller, is just as palpable. But his reign was short, 
and the paper was put into other hands: yet the public scorn was fixed 
on it already ; and nothing is truer than the proverb, that the first folly 
is irrecoverable. ‘ 
The next effort of this “ early genius” was to set up a little contemp- 
tible journal, soliciting subscriptions by the old system of self-praise and 
impertinence. This journal, too, went to the. confectioners after a few 
numbers. The public will swallow a good deal of nonsense; but there is 
a limit to its swallow ; it could not take down the “ Journal,” and so it 
rejected it upon the author. 
Our motive for speaking with this sincere scorn of this class of per- 
formance, is our feeling that, if personality should be suffered to run the 
career that it has begun, there is an end to all the honourable purposes 
of literature. Let it be once understood that low virulence and paltry 
sneering make their way to popularity, and there are individuals who 
would strike into that path with all the zeal of vulgar avarice. Of the 
individual in question we personally know nothing ; the miserable 
efforts that he has made to force himself into the public talk have failed, 
and we shall probably never have to mention his name again. He 
would, perhaps, make an useful assistant to old D’Israeli in cutting out 
paragraphs to manufacture into some other half-dozen dull volumes, and 
add to the “calamities of authors ;” he is evidently incapable of any 
thing better, and his only chance of escaping perpetual burlesque, is to 
content himself with “wearing his violet-coloured slippers,” ‘ slob- 
bering his Italian greyhound,” and sinking suddenly and finally into 
total oblivion. 
EPIGRAM. 
Orpheus, reckless of his life, 
To hell went to be with his wife, 
But many men on earth, no doubt, 
Would go to hell to be without. 
peel nT sence 
