THE NOVEL OF TO-DAY.

TO the novel-reader who has not confined the gratification of his taste to more recent productions, but has dipped into the pastoral and the chivalric romances of the seventeenth century, one of the few interesting features of that dreary region lies in the opportunities for contrasting the behavior of the lovers with that which novel-writers nowadays give to their heroes. On marking the difference, one involuntarily feels almost proud of his century for being in this particular a little less ridiculous than bygone times, although it may outrun them in a thousand other absurdities. To whatever quality it may be due, whether to common-sense, or lack of deference, or indolence, we no longer find the lover addressing his mistress in metaphors, the far-fetchedness of which would put to shame the worst of college puns, nor does he, at the critical moment, lay an exposition of his feelings before the lady, marked by all the elaborateness and ingenuity of a law-argument. The remarks of these chivalric knights on such occasions must have had an effect similar to that produced by a joke when told in ten times as many words as are necessary, and the fair maiden must have felt that all this flowery "gush" was far inferior to the "dumb eloquence" that accompanied it. But the modern hero has the good taste to perceive that a display of rhetoric is not fitted to the moment, and that brevity must be the soul of his argument. It is on this one string that the novel-writers of to-day play their simple and natural airs, - and it is wonderful what a variety it furnishes, far greater than was ever produced by the complicated mechanism from which the old romance-writers ground out their dreary tunes. If the seventeenth-century novels give a true picture of the life of that day, one cannot help thinking how differently life, as regards conversation, was arranged then from what it is now. In those times every one had a good deal to say, and had plenty of time to say it without interruption; but now, although we are just as talkative as our ancestors, we don't reel off our speech all at once, for, if we did, we should be called bores; but we break it up into short sentences, and our conversation becomes spicy. And so the popular novelist does n't allow his characters' tongues to run away with them, but gives his pages an interesting look by sprinkling over them a profusion of quotation-marks. The average reader, on opening a new book, is always favorably impressed in proportion as the paragraphs are short, for from this he gathers an impression of its liveliness.

It is not so many years since the class of "long-speech" novels died out, for its most prominent representatives in this century are the works of G. P. R. James. His minute descriptions of his heroines, beginning with the "finely pencilled eyebrows" and "shell-like ear," and extending to the "delicately turned ankle," give one the impression of an elegant china doll; and when from the mouth of this superb being issues a flood of pedantic sentiment, one turns with relief to the "One Summers" of our own time. Here we find something that might possibly happen in our own experience. However unpleasant it might be, there is certainly nothing unnatural in being poked as to the eye with a young lady's umbrella, and the species of "gush" indulged in by the hero and heroine we ourselves in a similar position would be glad to be guilty of. Then how much more real and lifelike are "Laura Doane" and "Maggie Grey" than those wooden beauties that James delights in! We get a glimpse of "fluffy hair," a "slight, graceful figure," and we don't care to know if the eyes are large and lustrous, and the complexion like alabaster. In fact, we should prefer to see a few freckles, if only to show that she is but "an earthly paragon," and no angel. If the scene is to be laid on this earth, then even the heroine ought to be endowed with a few of our imperfections, for through them her character appeals most strongly to the reader. If he has not her good qualities, he at least wants to sympathize with her shortcomings. In novel-reading our pleasure is confined wholly to the finite. If any future author shall be pleased to lay the scene of his story in Jupiter or Neptune, we shall not experience, but until that time we wish to see ourselves mirrored, and not the Jovials or the in-expect to find anything in common with our habitants of any ideal planet.

G.