Nor would I be understood to say that even a well-established author is not affected by what the critics may say of him; I only state that his circulation is not—­albeit they may make his very blood curdle.  I have a popular writer in my mind, who never looks at a newspaper unless it comes to him by a hand he can trust, for fear his eyes should light upon an unpleasant review.  His argument is this:  ’I have been at this work for the last twelve months, thinking of little else and putting my best intelligence (which is considerable) at its service.  Is it humanly probable that a reviewer who has given his mind to it for a less number of hours, can suggest anything in the way of improvement worthy of my consideration?  I am supposing him to be endowed with ability and actuated by good faith; that he has not failed in my own profession and is not jealous of my popularity; yet even thus, how is it possible that his opinion can be of material advantage to me?  If favourable, it gives me pleasure, because it flatters my amour propre, and I am even not quite sure that it does not afford a stimulating encouragement; but if unfavourable, I own it gives me considerable annoyance. [This is his euphemistic phrase to express the feeling of being in a hornets’ nest without his clothes on.] On the other hand, if the critic is a mere hireling, or a young gentleman from the university who is trying his ’prentice hand at a lowish rate of remuneration upon a veteran like myself, how still more idle would it be to regard his views!’

And it appears to me that there is really something in these arguments.  As regards the latter part of them, by-the-bye, I had the pleasure of seeing my own last immortal story spoken of in an American magazine—­the Atlantic Monthly—­as the work of ’a bright and prosperous young author.’  The critic (Heaven bless his young heart, and give him a happy Whitsuntide) evidently imagined it to be my first production.  In another Transatlantic organ, a critic, speaking of the last work of that literary veteran, the late Mr. Le Fanu, observes:  ’If this young writer would only model himself upon the works of Mr. William Black in his best days, we foresee a great future before him.’

There is one thing that I think should be set down to the credit of the literary profession—­that for the most part they take their ‘slatings’ (which is the professional term for them) with at least outward equanimity.  I have read things of late, written of an old and popular writer, ten times more virulent than anything Mr. Ruskin wrote of Mr. Whistler:  yet neither he, nor any other man of letters, thinks of flying to his mother’s apron-string, or of setting in motion old Father Antic, the Law.  Perhaps it is that we have no money, or perhaps, like the judicious author of whom I have spoken, we abstain from reading unpleasant things.  I wish to goodness we could abstain from hearing of them; but the ‘d——­d good-natured friend’ is an eternal creation.