READE, CHARLES. 



687 



perhaps for a century, or until the pressure 

 of a dense population has rendered economy 

 of land profitable. At present, the only use 

 that we can make of a large section of our 

 country is to devote it to grazing, without re- 

 gard to area. 



In conclusion, we may ask, What will be an 

 adequate mileage of the railways of the United 

 States in the first decade of the next century, 

 or twenty years hence, when our population 

 will number about 100,000,000, and when 500,- 

 000 square miles of our area of 3,000,000 may 

 yield 50 per cent, more product to each square 

 mile than the present average, or than the mod- 

 erate estimates that have been adopted in the 

 construction of the last table ? 



KEADE, CHARLES, an English novelist, born at 

 Ipsden, Oxfordshire, June 8, 1814; died "in 

 London, April 11, 1884. He was descended 

 from an ancient family, the seventh and young- 

 est son of a country squire, John Reade, of Ips- 

 den House. He was educated at 

 Magdalen College, Oxford, taking 

 his bachelor's degree with a third 

 class in classics in 1835, and was 

 elected to a Vinerian scholarship 

 and a fellowship in his college in 

 1842. The university conferred up- 

 on him subsequently the degree of 

 D. 0. L. He was called to the bar 

 at Lincoln's Inn in 1843, but devoted 

 his attention to literature, writing 

 extensively but anonymously for 

 London journals and magazines. In 

 1852 was published under his own 

 name the novel of "Peg Woffing- 

 ton," which at once made his repu- 

 tation. About this time he wrote 

 in collaboration with Tom Taylor 



tion pointed and sententious. His next work, 

 'I It's Never too Late to Mend" (1856), estab- 

 lished his reputation as a master of fiction. In 

 this he first displayed a peculiarity that mars 

 several of his finest works, that of importing 

 into his novels, otherwise worked out with the 

 highest art, a heterogeneous picture of some so- 

 cial wrong against which he wishes to inveigh 

 as a moralist. The telling effect of these vivid 

 descriptions led him to repeat the fault for the 

 sake of the reformatory results, which he could 

 achieve better through his novels than if he 

 chose another mode of conveyance for his les- 

 sons. He formed the habit of collecting news- 

 paper items, reports of tribunals, and other 

 exact data, in order to derive his plots and in- 

 cidents and characters from real life. Besides 

 drawing his materials from newspapers, blue- 

 books, books of travel, etc., he .sometimes took 

 plots and situations that had been used by 

 other writers, and in several instances pur- 



the play of " Masks and Faces," the 

 plot of which is nearly the same. 

 The novel went through several edi- 

 tions, and was repu Wished in Amer- 

 ica. The year following he pub- 

 lished " Christie Johnstone," a still 

 more popular story. These works 

 were marked in the composition of 

 the plot and the disposal of inci- 

 dents by a dramatic quality such as 

 characterizes the works of French 

 authors who, like Charles Reade, 

 combine the arts of the playwright 

 and the novelist. He began writing 

 novels and plays about the same 

 time. "Gold," a five -act drama, 

 was produced in 1850 ; in 1854, 

 in conjunction with Tom Taylor, a 

 volume of plays containing " Masks 

 and Faces,'' "Two Loves and a Life," and 

 "The King's Rival." His first two novels 

 were followed in 1855 by " Clouds and Sun- 

 shine " and " Art : a Dramatic Tale," both of 

 which found many readers. The dramatic qual- 

 ities of his style were more predominant in his 

 maturer novels, symmetrical in plot, the action 

 lively, the characters strongly marked, the dic- 



CHARLES KEADE. 



chased the productions of other writers to work 

 over. These practices subjected him to fre- 

 quent charges of plagiarism, and involved him 

 in many angry controversies. In this way he 

 was enabled to describe with scientific cor- 

 rectness the circumstances of all phases of life, 

 and to introduce effectively many realistic in- 

 cidents and details ; but his characters are too 



