Morris: Irving's Fiction in France 



11 



of M. Haussaire, Irving was not an original genius. "He invented 

 nothing," he says, "but he rejuvenated a branch of hterature ah^eady 

 old, by the attention he gave to detail, by the boldness of his stroke, 

 by the exquisite grace of his form, and, above all, by the accuracy of 

 his observation." Like many others, M. Haussaire thinks that 

 Irving's observation is at fault only when he looks at England. He 

 complained that Irving "does not go to the bottom of his subject, 

 and still less around it". 



M. Fievet, like M. Haussaire, notes Irving's "exquisite feeling for 

 nature", and to it ascribes much of the charm of his writings. He does 

 not consider him a thinker, nor even a very profound observer. "He 

 contents himself with observing, or rather with allowing his artist's 

 soul to dream," he says, "without effort, generally without intent to 

 study, guided merely by his love of the beautiful and the picturesque." 

 It is in this capacity for becoming completely absorbed in revery, 

 thinks M. Fievet, that Irving's talent consists. "His revery," he 

 says, "is for him what the picture is to the painter, melody to the 

 musician: it steals upon him, ravishes him, it is his joy, it is the life 

 of his soul, it takes form and color thru a secret process of elaboration, 

 like the flower in the calyx, and it is only at the moment when it has 

 become a type of beauty that it issues forth, so to speak, from itself, 

 and blossoms in the full light of day. Thanks to this natural endow- 

 ment Irving was able to give so felicitous, so new a form to well-worn 

 themes. It is this gift which is his veritable originality and which 

 enabled him, while following in the footsteps of the English classics, 

 Addison and Goldsmith, to remain nevertheless himself and to add a 

 model to those whom he had imitated." 



III. Synthesis of Appreciations 



Irving's Mental Faculties. Having taken note of the more 

 important observations contained in the most noteworthy French 

 appreciations of Irving, arranged chronologically, let us now examine 

 the whole body of French criticism of him, or rather all of it that we 

 have been able to discover, with a view to ascertaining the concensus 

 of French opinion on some of the questions that naturally arise in 

 connection with the study of any man of letters, such as his place in 

 literature, the extent of his originality, the elements that go to make 

 up his talent, his mental organization, etc. 



First, what was the character, according to French critics, of 

 Irving's emotions, of his imagination, of his observation, and of his 

 judgment? 



