“A story of extraordinary power, and, which is a still greater eulogy, of power devoted to a great and beneficent purpose.  Mr. Martin Tupper (the author) is already known to the world by his ’Proverbial Philosophy,’ and other works which indicate an extraordinarily gifted mind and an originality of conception and treatment rare indeed in these latter days,—­but he has never demonstrated these qualities to such perfection as in his present deeply interesting work, wherein romance is united to wisdom, and both to practical utility.  Terror is there in its sternest shape—­the hateful lust of gold is shown in all its hideous deformity and inconceivable meanness, and through the awful suspense that hovers over the incidents, occasional gleams of pure and hallowed love come to humanise the darkness.  This is cue of the few fictions constructed to stand the shocks of time.”

And of the other tales we find the following from the pen of the celebrated Mr. St. John, when he was editor of the Sunday Times.  He speaks of the three tales together:—­

“In every page of this work there is something which a reader would wish to bear in his memory for ever.  For power of animated description, for eloquent reflections upon the events of everyday life, and for soft, touching, pathetic appeals to the best feelings of the heart, these tales are worthy of a place on every library table in the kingdom.  They are well calculated to add to the author’s already established reputation.”

Of this trilogy of tales, undoubtedly the best is the “Crock of Gold:”  “The Twins,” though written from living models, is very inferior, as the hero is too goody-goody and the villain too hopelessly wicked:  “Heart” has more merit, and has been much praised by a celebrated authoress for its touching chapter on Old Maids.  Much of it also is autobiographical, as with “The Twins.”

CHAPTER XVI.

AESOP SMITH.

“AEsop Smith’s Rides and Reveries” is one of the books which, really written by me from beginning to end, is nominally only edited.  It is a volume of self-experiences, to be read “through the lines,”—­and almost every incident and character therein is drawn from living models and actual facts.  It grew naturally out of the simple circumstance that I used daily to ride out alone on one of my horses—­more exactly, mares—­Minna and Brenda, and jotted down my cantering fancies in prose or verse when I got home.  Hurst & Blackett were its publishers in 1858,—­and it soon was all sold off, but did not come to a second edition in London, though reproduced widely in New York and Philadelphia.  The fact is that, between an independent publisher who sells a little over cost price, and a Gargantua purchaser of thousands at a time, like Smith or Mudie, the poor author is sacrificed:  he has received his fee for the edition (I got L100 for this first and only) and forthwith finds himself