FORSTER'S LIFE OF DICKENS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume X, Issue 2829, 21 February 1873, Page 3

FORSTER'S LIFE OF DICKENS.

In Mr. Forster's secoud volume of the Life of Charles Dickens, -which has just appeared, we are privileged to see fin author's outline of his own tale. We leave people to say—interesting as the fragment is—ivlio .would be, content with ah'outline' o'f'Doihbey and Son. Certainly it is a new world to which Mi - . ITorater introduces iu. We get, for instance, the author's mental debate upon that event that made a nation mourn —the death of Paul Dombey—whether it should be delayed or not. Such points were very seriously considered by Dickens. All the tallc about Ihe difficulties the biographer would have with the second volume vanishes. We are carried through the most eventful part of the novelist's life, each page teeming with notes of the greatest interest. The years spent in writing " Martin Chuzzlewit," "Dombey and Son," "David Copperfield," the ."Christmas Tides," uud on io " Bleak House," are here reviewed. We shall have people saying much about the volume for many days to eouie, and all the world will bo talking about-e now chapter iu the life of our old friend-Mrs. Ganip. , .■ It seem 3 that after an amateur theatrical trip in 1847, Dickeii3 conceived the idea of Sirs. Gamp going down with the company to Liverpool for u holiday trip, with the chance I of professional duties. On her return she tells her friend Mrs. Karris all about it, and her account was to have been published, but the intention became an "unfinished faucy," and now we get a couple of new chapters nbout Mrs. Cramp. She is seated in the railway traiu with " Mr. Wilson," who goes iu charge I of the and who points out.on the station phitfortn the- illustrious personages .of the.; amateur company — •' Drat my beebgraffer, sir;"-I says,"' he has given me no tegiou to wish to know anything about him." " P'raps," he says, "if you're not of the party, you don't know who it wa3 that assisted you into this carriage !" " No, sir," I eiivs, " I don't indeed."] " Why, ma'am," ho says, a wisperin', " that was G-eorge, ma'am." " What George, sir ? I don't know no George," says I. "The great George, ma'am," sajs be. "The Crookshanks." If you'll believe me, Mrs. Harris, I turns my head, and see the wery man a making picture of me-on his thumb nailatthe winder ! , while another of 'em—a tall, eliin, melancholy geut,* with dark hair and a bage voice—looksover his shoulder, with his head o , one side a3 if he understood the subject, and dpoly snys, " I've drawed her several times —in Punch," he save too ! The owdacious wretch !

" Which I never touches, Mr. Wilson," I romurUa out loud—l wouldn't. Inive helped it, Mrs. Harris, if you hud took iny life for it! — " which I never touches, Mr. Wilson, on account of the lemon !"

" Hush !'' say 3 JJIr. Wilson, " there he is !" I only see a f»t gentleman with curly bkek hair and a merry facet u staading on the platform rubbing his two hands over ono ituother, us if he was Trashing of 'era, unci shaking his head mid sliouldcrn wery much ; and I wus a wondering wot Mr. Wilson meant, wen ho says, " There's Dougladgo, Mrs. G-anip!" he says. " there's him Hβ wrote the life of Mrs. CaUdle !"

Airs. Harris, wen I see. that little williiinj bodily before me, it give me such a turn thai I was all in a tremble. If I hadn't lost my umbercllcr in the cab, I must have done hiin a injury with it! Oh, the bragain little traitor ! right among the ladies, Mrs. Harris, looking hi* wickedest and deci-itfullc-stof eyes while he was il talking to 'em ; laughing at his own jokes as loud as you please ; holding his hat in onV hand-to cool his-sef, and tossing back his irongrßy mop of a head of hair with the other, iis'l if it was so much shavings—there, Mra. Harris, I see him, getting encouragement from the pretty delooded creeturs, which never kuow'd that sweet saint, Mrs. C, us I did, and being treated with as much confidence as if he'd never wiolated none of the domestic ties, and never showed up nothing !***** "This resolulo gent,"§ ho says, "a coming along hero as i 3 apporeutly going to take the railways by storm —him with'the tight"legs, and his weskit very much buttoned, and his mouth very much shut, and his coat a (lying open, and his heels r. giving it to the platform, is :u cricket and beeograffer, and our principal trugegian." " But who," says I, when the beU had left off, and the train begun to move, " who, Mr. Wilson, is tho wild gent in the prespiriition.H that's been a tearing up and down all this time with a groat box of papers under his arm, a talking to everybody wory indistinct, and exciting of himself dreadful ?" " Why ?" says Air. Wilson, with a smile. " Because, sir," I says, " he's being left behiud." " 0-ood God !" cries Mr. Wilson, turning pale and putting out his head, " it's your beeo-urulTer-the Manager —and ho lias got the niuivy, Mrs. Gamp !" Houa'ever, soino one chucked him into the train and we went oil". At the first abreek of the whistle, Mrs. Harris, I turned white, for I had look notice of eoruo .of them dear creeturs as was the cause of my being in company, and I know'd tho danger that—but Mr. Wilson, which is a married man, puts his hand on miue, and says, " Mrs. Gamp, cahn yourself; it's only the Ingein."

ilark Twain and n frion'd met at an hotel where Air. Grough, the tompornnco advocate, was also staying at the time, and concluded to amuse themselves by sending a " cocktail" to Mr. Gough's room. On its arrival there it was of course refused, but the waiter drank it on the way down stairs, and reported " all right" to tho delighted humourists. A second and a third "cocktail" wero taken up and disposed of in like manner, when Mr. G-ongh appeared on the scone and spoiled tho joko by exposing the craft of the waiter, whom ho liad followed and detected in the act of absorbing the last beverage. Lite-prolonging Powbe. — " Whom the gode love die young" receives no confirmation from the two men who are probably most adiiiirec'i, reverenced, or talked of at present. Thiers and Livingstone, tho one beyond, the other a little short of, tho terms of yeiiM allowed to man by the Psalniiat, are striking examples of what we have more than once maintained—tho life-prolonging power of keen menta.l occupation and successful enterprise. The witty and accomplished author of the " Secret of Long Lifo" sees most chance for longevity in the " Still-leben" of the country, with its gentle Horatian enjoyments, moral and intellectual. We doubt this view, iiermiu are not long-lived, and fi country gentlemen survive the threescore years and ten, it is by a mode of life precisely the reverse of the lounging dilletante. Town life appears to stimulate the bruin and nervous system —the reeervoir of vatality—far more than rural, us is Been in the much rarer occurrence of idiocy or imbecility of the gamin of tlie busy atreot than in tho child of tho torpid villuge. And as with tho child, so with the man. Providence seems wisely to ha»e ordained that life should be prolonged in proportion to the value of its possessor as a man and a citizen. — Lancet.

BANKRUPTCY COURT.-Thuesday. [Before the Registrar, Laughlin O'Brien, Esq.] A Court was held yesterday for the hearing of unopposed cases. ■ Rβ Hthan Pihneas Coiten (Deed of Assignment).—Mr. DeVore appeared for the "bankrupt. This was an application to declare the complete execution of a deed, of assignment for the benefit of creditors. Tonks aii'd" Morton Jones were appointed trustees. The liabilities amount to £2,100; assets, £1,700. The usunl notices in the Ga-M'te were proved in the ordinary way. There was no opposition, the deed being assented to by a majority of the creditors, representing £I,SOO. Tlio usual order w;is made declaring the deed completely executed. '