INTRODUCTION 



" Yes, she must be all this, and possess a thousand other good 

 qualities, many more than are enumerated by lago, so as never to 

 descend for a moment from the pedestal on which her baron has 

 set her up. Is this indulgent — is it even reasonable ? Can he 

 expect any human creature to be always dancing on the tight 

 rope ? . . . Men are very hard in the way of exaction on those 

 they love. All 'take' seems their motto, and as little 'give' as 

 possible. If they would but remember the golden rule, and expect 

 no more than should be expected from themselves, it might be a 

 better world for everybody." 



And then, as if recollecting that the short- 

 coming had not been all on his own side, Whyte- 

 Melville ends the colloquy with Bones, by making 

 his fleshless companion observe — 



" I never knew but one woman who could understand reason, 

 and she wotildnH listen to it / " 



For an unprofessional writer, Whyte- Melville's 

 literary diligence was remarkable. Few men, 

 who, like him, were independent of and indifferent 

 to the pecuniary fruits of their labour, would have 

 cared to undergo the drudgery necessary to pro- 

 ducing twenty-eight separate works in twenty-six 

 years. But Whyte-Melville was a born story- 

 teller, and from the first he never lacked an 

 audience. Man of the w^orld in the best sense, 

 he gave the impression of one who never lost 

 consciousness of something beyond the world. 

 His writings abound in passages of true philo- 

 sophy, not less profound because expressed in 

 terms suggestive of levity. Perhaps the chapter 



xvi 



