16 Indiana University Studies 



'Veritable mock-heroic epic", the humor is said to be 'Vorthy of 

 Swift, of a Swift deprived, of course, of his bitterness" the Sketch- 

 book, the History of New York, and Bracebridge Halt are ''three 

 masterpieces of humor", says Odysse Barot in his Litterature con- 

 temporaine en Angleterre (p. 217). Attention has been called to the 

 fact that Irving's fantastic tales, unlike those of Poe, are robbed of 

 their terrors by the humor which envelops them. "His amiable 

 ironical smile," writes Emile Lauvriere, in his treatise on Poe, His 

 Life and His Works, ^'is as fatal to their element of terror as a bright 

 ray of sunlight is to stormy clouds" (p. 509). 



Irving's French critics think, for the most part, that thanks to 

 his good sense and his good taste his humor almost always avoids the 

 fault of exaggeration, for, altho Fontaney thinks that the humor of 

 Bracebridge Hall is "extravagant" and another says that some of 

 his sketches "border too closely on caricature", many others judge 

 that he maintains a reserve that is admirable. 



His Art. The artistic quality of Irving's writings has been 

 frequently noted: "The Sketch-book shows us an artist behind the 

 observer" "We find the same love of picturesque detail" "He 

 admires and loves the beautiful in all nature — in characters, in 

 history, in legends — he is an enthusiastic artist. "^^ Even in its 

 smallest details his work betrays the artist — "One may say that each 

 part [of the Sketch-book] is chiseled ai3d cut with infinite art." 

 Apropos of the same book, M. Haussaire says: ^ 'These notes, before 

 being given to the public, had been reviewed, arranged, corrected, 

 and chiseled with the care of an artist and a lover of letters" (p. 8); 

 and farther on; "He has rejuvenated a genre already old by ... . 

 the delicacy and the polish of the details" (p. 15). M. Sachot affirms 

 that the chronicles of Wolferfs Roost ''offer a series of curious legends 

 . . . and all related with . . . that talent for arrangement possessed 

 in such perfection by the author of the Sketch-book^' (p. 385). His art is 

 especially noticeable, according to "E. D.", in his selection of ma- 

 terials. "The art with which the author has chosen from among the 

 emotions experienced by a traveler on the continent, those that were 

 not common," he says, "is precisely what makes the charm of his 

 book" [the Sketch-book].^^ 



In this connection may be mentioned the tribute paid by French 



35 Fievet, p. viii. 



36 "F. A. S.", Globe, 827, 174. 



37 Rosenzweig, p. viii. 



38 Haussaire, 11. 



39 Milne, p. vii. 



40 Globe, 1827, p. 523. 



