Were any needed, stronger proof of the truth of this proposition could not be given than is afforded by the zeal with which the greatest novelists since their day have turned aside to contemplate and to chronicle the career of this immortal pair, whose names, notwithstanding the dissimilarity of genius and style, seem destined to be as eternally coupled together as those of the twin sons of Leda.  To the rescue from oblivion of their personal histories, a host of biographers have appeared, scattered over the whole period that has elapsed since their deaths to the present time.  The first life that appeared of Tobias George Smollett came from the hands of his friend and companion, the celebrated Dr. Moore, himself a novel-writer of no mean fame.  To him succeeded Anderson; who in turn was followed by Sir Walter Scott, the fruits of whose unrivalled capacity for obtaining information are before the world in the form of a most delightful memoir.  So that when Roscoe, at a later date, took up the same theme, he found that the investigations of his predecessors had left him little more to do than to make selections or abridgments, and to arrange what new matter he had come into possession of.  One would have thought that with all these labors the public appetite should have been satisfied,—­that everything apt to be heard with interest of and about Smollett had been said.  So far from this being the case, however, it was but a few years ago, that, as we all recollect, the brilliant pen of Thackeray was brought to bear on the same subject, and the great humorist of this generation employed his talents worthily in illustrating the genius of a past age.  “‘Humphrey Clinker,’” says he, “is, I do believe, the most laughable story that has ever been written since the goodly art of novel-writing began.”  This is strong praise, though but of a single book; yet it falls short of the general estimate that Walter Scott formed of the capacity of our author.  “We readily grant to Smollett,” he says, “an equal rank with his great rival, Fielding, while we place both far above any of their successors in the same line of fictitious composition.”

After the testimonies we have cited, it would be useless to seek other approbation of Smollett’s merits.

  “From higher judgment-seats make no appeal
  To lower.”

Yet, with all his imaginative power and humorous perception, it cannot be gainsaid that there was a great lack of delicacy in the composition of his mind,—­a deficiency which, even in his own days, gave just offence to readers of the best taste, and which he himself was sometimes so candid as to acknowledge and to correct.  Its existence is too often a sufficient cause to deter any but minds of a certain masculine vigor from the perusal of such a work as “Roderick Random”; and yet this work was an especial favorite with the most refined portion of the public in the latter half of the last century.  Burke delighted in it, and would no doubt often read