FICTION, EARLY AND LATE. 153 



There are limitations in the work of every 

 man. With such a man as Jefferies, the limi- 

 tations were narrower than with most of those 

 who make a mark in the history of literature. 

 He was to succeed in one way only in one 

 way. Outside that way, failure, check, disap- 

 pointment, even derision, awaited him. In the 

 " Eulogy of Kichard Jefferies " one can afford 

 to confess these limitations. He is so richly 

 endowed that one can well afford to confess 

 them. It no more detracts from his worth 

 and the quality of his work to own that he 

 was no novelist than it would be to confess 

 that he was no sculptor. 



But the wonder of it ! How could such a 

 man write these works, being already five or 

 six and twenty years of age, without revealing 

 himself ? It is as if one who was to become a 

 great singer should make his first attempt and 

 break down without even revealing the fact 

 that he had a noble voice, as yet untrained. 

 Or as if one destined to be a great painter 

 should send in a picture for exhibition in 

 which there was no drawing, or sense of colour, 

 or grouping, or management of lights, or any 



