GREAT BOOKS. 



. if (hey work the muno iininlmr of hours a day, supposing that 

 <>f th" Mcond set can do ui much work in an hour a* 3 of the first? 

 is. If a man. his wife, and child drink a barrel of boor in U days, 

 how long would it take 3 couples, each with :i children, to drink 2 barrels, 

 a man drinking twice us much as a woman, and a woman twice as 

 much us a child ? 



GREAT BOOKS. 



EL THE SPECTATOR. 



ENGLISH literature, np to the time of Queen Anne, was con- 

 fined to large and expensive works, if we except the pamphlets 

 and fly-sheets which were designed to answer merely special 

 and temporary purposes. In April, 1709, however, Richard 

 Steele prodncod his periodical paper, the Tatler, which continued 

 in the form of numbers, issued three times a week, until the 

 beginning of 1711. The essays thus given to the public, and 

 which in their combined form rank among the classics of our 

 tongue, contained a lively picture of existing manners, together 

 with a pleasant vein of moralising. So much success attended 

 them that the chief writers determined on a more ambitious 

 venture. Accordingly, the Taller was followed by the still 

 more celebrated Spectator, the first number of which appeared 

 on the 1st of March, 1711. Instead of being issued only throe 

 times a week, it came forth daily, and the plan was at once 

 more elaborate and more select. The short paragraphs of news 

 which accompanied the earlier of the Taller essays, and which 

 reach us at the present day like broken echoes from the fields? 

 where Marlborough fought, or from the courtly circles where 

 statesmen intrigued, were entirely omitted, as, indeed, they had 

 ultimately been in the first periodical ; a larger amount of 

 serious criticism was imported into the work ; and the fiction of 

 a club was introduced, which gave a certain unity to the whole 

 production. From the Tatter and the Spectator we may date 

 the commencement of English periodical literature. 



Both these papers wore under the conduct of Steele, and it 

 was the pen of that gay and airy writer which furnished the 

 greater number of tho essays to the Taller. He had the assist- 

 ance, however, of Addison, whose contributions to the Spectator 

 were so numerous and important that the work is always 

 associated with his name, rather than with that of Steele. 

 Nevertheless, the fiction of a club, whose proceedings and 

 lucubrations form the staple of the series, seems to have been 

 the invention of the latter. Although the existence of the club 

 is noticed in No. 1, which is by Addison, it is not until No. 2, 

 written by Steele, that we have a detailed account of its 

 members. It is then that we are introduced to Sir Roger de 

 Coverley, Sir Andrew Preeport, Will Honeycomb, Captain 

 Sentry, and the others. Still, the principal of these characters 

 Sir Roger de Coverley was almost entirely worked out by 

 Addison, and the honour must rest with him. That honour is 

 no mean one. Few better-known or more charming figures 

 exist in the gallery of fictitious portraiture. Sir Roger is a 

 delightful specimen of the old English country gentleman ; 

 simple-natnred, kindly, pious, and patriotic ; a little prejudiced, 

 it must be owned ; not very profound or accomplished ; but 

 with plenty of good sense and good feeling, exquisitely flavoured 

 with a dash of whimsicality. The other members of the club 

 are also well drawn ; but the chief figure, undoubtedly, is the 

 old Worcestershire baronet. 



The history of the Spectator is somewhat curious. Each 

 number originally appeared as a single leaf of about the same 

 size as its modern namesake, divided into two columns on each 

 page, and issued at a penny. A portion of the space was given 

 np to advertisements, and the literary matter consisted entirely 

 of a single ensay. The paper at once became a great success, 

 and in the tenth number it is stated, on the authority of tho 

 publisher, that the sale was 3,000 a day a large total for those 



times, when readers were far les numerous than they are now. 

 AddiBon'a friend Tickellhas recorded that the M! sometimes 

 reached 20,000 ; bat it is difficult to believe this, when we 

 recollect that, in the reign of Queen Anne, hand -printing was 

 the only method of taking impressions that existed, and thai 

 tho slowness of the process was necessarily opposed to a very 

 large circulation, unless when spread over a great length of 

 time, which would hardly apply to the numbers of a periodical. 

 Whatever the sale may have been, however, it was considerably 

 decreased by the Government imposition of a stamp-duty on 

 papers printed on a half-sheet, which first took effect on the 

 1st of August, 1712, and was the beginning of the tax on news- 

 papers, which continued until the year 1855. The original 

 stamp-duty was only a halfpenny ; but the conductors of the 

 Spectator raised the price of each number to twopence, in the 

 hope of making np the loss which they feared would result 

 from adding even a halfpenny to the price. As it was, the sate 

 dropped to less than half, and, although there was afterwards 

 some little recovery, the paper languished on the whole from 

 that time forth, so that it can hardly be doubted that the 

 Spectator was eventually killed by a very objectionable tax. 

 Symptoms of dissolution became apparent some time before the 

 actual end was reached. In the autumn of 1712 the several 

 characters began to be dismissed some by death (as Sir Roger 

 de Coverley himself), and others by various methods of account- 

 ing' for their secession from the club which wae supposed to be 

 the source whence the paper issued. No. 556, dated December 

 6th, 1712, brought the first series of the Spectator to a close 

 with an address from Steele in his own proper person. These 

 555 numbers form the first seven volumes of the collected 

 edition. The eighth volume consists of certain additional 

 numbers (issued only three times a week) which appeared in 

 1714, from the 18th of June to December 20th. With No. C35 

 the work came to a final stop. 



In its own day the Spectator was read in every coffee-house, 

 in every fashionable circle, in the haunts of wit and gallantry, 

 and in many private families. It was the oracle of taste, the 

 censor of manners, the preacher of a sedate yet cheerful morality. 

 One of its objects was to discourage frivolity, licentiousness, 

 and irreligion, while regulating the habits of the town in such 

 light matters as dress, social conversation, and amusement". 

 Addison alone was thoroughly qualified for either of theee 

 offices. Tou may find him one day bantering some folly with 

 all the gaiety of a wit in a comedy, and the next delivering him- 

 self of a sermon which might have been owned by his father, the 

 rector. We at the present day are sometimes a little surprised 

 at the frankness and freedom with which the town life of those 

 times is described and discussed in, a periodical which wae 

 supposed to be everybody's reading. But the motive was 

 always good, and the Spectator was really a reforming influence 

 in a London which still retained not a little of the profligacy 

 encouraged by the wits of Charles II.' s reign. The paper like- 

 wise did much towards fixing a more graceful and cultivated 

 style than had before prevailed ; and it created a model for a 

 class of literary journals which, like itself, have contributed to 

 the intellectual riches of the English tongue. 



LESSONS IN DRAWING. XXI. 



THERE are a few more observations to make upon the propor- 

 tions of the entire figure, before we introduce those relating to 

 the face and head. We consider this to be necessary, because, 

 when practically employed in drawing the figure, we must deter- 

 mine upon its action and proportions before the details are 

 entered upon. Then the head and face claim our first attention. 

 Some artists design their groups in the nude, and clothe them 

 afterwards, by which means they obtain a more life-like repre- 

 sentation than when they proceed by drawing drapery only in 

 conjunction with the extremities the head, hands, and feet. By 

 this process not only are the proportions better maintained, but 

 the contour of the body and limbs is established also ; and, espo 

 cially when the costumes fit closely, we know of no coarse of 

 practice more favourable than this for giving expression and 

 character to the whole design. 



The unit of proportion employed to regulate the height of 

 the figure is the head, and various have been the opinions and 

 practice of artists as to the number of lengths of the head to 



