James Payn

“ To expose the shortcomings of the work in question is not a pleasant task, for the author of it is very young—" just verging," as he expresses it, "on his twenty-first year of mortality;" but the fact is, his faults are not those of immaturity, but of that ignorance and misconception of English life and thought which lie at the root of all that has been written of us by his fellow-countrymen. ”

“ Notwithstanding that we have become imperial in our actions, we remain in our feelings insular. The fact is shown beyond all doubt by the relative popularity of English fiction. Let ever so great a novel-writer select a foreign scene for the incidents of his story, and that story falls flat and does not get up again George Eliot’s "Romola" is but one example out of hundreds. We English must be familiar with the place written about before we can take an interest in the dramatis personæ ”

“ They even publish a magazine in our language—or in what they confidently believe to be such—which is certainly amusing, and in its way instructive, for it shows the utter hopelessness of our becoming intelligible to them. ”

“ Where our author is at his weakest is in sarcasm. He has given us a poem in the style and metre of "Don Juan" which is, perhaps, the worst that has ever obtained the honors of print. It is directed against our social vices; but, fortunately for us, wherever he intends to be extraordinarily severe, he becomes completely unintelligible.
Such rows are very common at the ‘Change,
In London, the resort of wealth and fashion,
Where men never cheat, but purses sharp estrange,
So honorable is their intention ”

“ It seems evident that in the third line of this noble verse our author had some muddle in his mind connected with Shakespeare’s "the wise do call convey," but for the rest he must have drawn his inspiration and his rhymes, if from any known writer, from the poet Close. His knowledge of London, I fear, has been derived from some practical joker; though his way of expressing it is all his own. He retains the same unapproachable style in describing Indian life. Here is a picture of what India was before the English rule—
No lavished charges burthened then the state ”

“ There is so much rubbish talked about the growing sympathy of native races with ourselves, and of "the giant strides" which their intelligence is taking, that an exhibition of the latest specimen may be wholesome. ”

“ Notwithstanding this modest compliment to Miss Dutt our "original and genuine muse," as he calls himself, is not deficient in self-confidence; he shows that to have "a gude conceit o’ oursels" is not peculiar to the thermal line of Edinburgh; and, to begin with, in the dedication of his poem, he appeals to the Creator himself. ”