ART. V. The History of Fiction: being a Critical Account of the most celebrated Prose Works of Fiction from the earliest Greek Romances to the Novels of the present Age. By John Dunlop. 3 vols. 12mo. Edinburgh. 1814.

MR. DUNLOP apologizes for the defects of his work with

much good sense and modesty.

To some of my readers I may appear, perhaps, to have dwelt too shortly on some topics, and to have bestowed a disproportionate attention on others; nor is it improbable that in a work of such extent and variety, omissions may have occurred of what ought not to have been neglected. Such defects were inseparable from an inquiry of this description, and must have, in some degree, existed even if I could have bestowed on it undivided attention, and if, instead of a relaxation, it had been my sole employment. I shall consider myself, however, as having effected much if I turn to this subject the attention of other writers, whose opportunities of doing justice to it are more favourable than my own. A work, indeed, of the kind I have undertaken, is not of a nature to be perfected by a single individual, and at a first attempt, but must be the result of successive investigations. By the assistance of preceding researches on the same subject, the labour of the future inquirer will be abridged, and he will thus be enabled to correct the mistakes, and supply the deficiencies, of those who have gone before him.'-vol. iii. p. 404.

However prepossessed we may be in favour of a writer who thus expresses himself, we must be explicit. His talents (and they are far from inconsiderable) are not combined with the acquirements which alone can render him capable of doing justice to the extensive subject he has chosen: and he has, therefore, executed a defective plan, in what we incline to think rather a superficial manner. There is no reason to wonder at this failure. The materials indispensably necessary for such a work, and the want of which no ingenuity can supply, are scattered in so many private and public libraries, that the mere preparatory collections would occupy years of laborious research. We regret, both for our sakes, and for Mr. Dunlop's, that he has not had it in his power to visit the ancient and secluded regions of romance as frequently as could be wished. In order, therefore, to furnish his readers with a description of Broceliande, and Thamelinde, and the other strange countries, whose names have vanished from our maps, he has been too often compelled to content himself with the information which he has picked up from the way-farers who have personally explored them. He has done well to trust to such travellers as Ellis, Scott and Southey; they are good men and true:' but it unfortunately happens that many of the pilgrims to whom he has listened, cannot boast of equal intelligence and veracity; and

he

he has consequently adopted no small proportion of loose and incorrect relation.

Mr. Dunlop begins by remarking that the taste for this species of composition seems to have been most early and most generally prevalent in Persia and other Asiatic regions, where the nature of the climate, and the luxury of the inhabitants, conspired to promote its cultivation.'-vol. i. p. 4. We have very little confidence in the influence supposed to be exercised by climate over the moral character of mankind we doubt whether genius of any kind actually rises or falls with the mercury in the thermometer; and at all events, we must be allowed to suggest, that a long winter's night and a blazing fire are full as congenial to the cultivation of story-telling as the clearest atmosphere, and the warmest sunshine. After settling the original seat of fiction, he thus proceeds:

'The people of Asia Minor, who possessed the fairest portion of the globe, were addicted to every species of luxury and magnificence; and having fallen under the dominion of the Persians, imbibed with the utmost avidity the amusing fables of their conquerors. The Milesians, who were a colony of Greeks, and spoke the Ionic dialect, excelled all the neighbouring nations in ingenuity, and first caught from the Persians this rage for fiction. The tales they invented, and of which the name has become so celebrated, have all perished. There is little known of them, except that they were not of a very moral tendency, and were principally written by a person of the name of Aristidis, whose stories were translated into Latin by Sisenna, the Roman historian, about the time of the civil wars of Marius and Sylla.

'But though the Milesian tales have perished, of their nature some idea may be formed from the stories of Parthenius Nicenus; many of which, there is reason to believe, are extracted from these ancient fables, or at least are written in the same spirit. The tales of Nicenus are about forty in number, but appear to be mere sketches. They chiefly consist of accounts of every species of seduction, and the criminal passions of the nearest relations. The principal characters generally come to some deplorable end, though seldom proportioned to what they merited from their vices. Nicenus seems to have engrafted the Milesian tales on the mythological fables of Apollodorus and similar writers; and also to have borrowed from early historians and poets, whose productions have not descended to us. The work is inscribed to Cornelius Gallus, the Latin poet, the contemporary and friend of Virgil. Indeed, the author says that it was composed for his use, to furnish him with materials for elegies and other poems.'-vol. i. p. 4.

In my youth, says Montaigne, I did not even know the names of Lancelot of the Lake, or Huon of Bordeaux, or Amadis of Gaul, or of any of the worthless books with which our youngsters waste their time. Perhaps the epithet by which Plutarch characterises the 'Milesian fables,' and which Mr. Dunlop seems inclined to adopt, may have been as unduly severe as that we have just quoted.

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The scanty vestiges of those which remain, seem to shew that, occasionally at least, their subjects were sufficiently innocent to satisfy the most sober moralist. An instance may be found in Conon, an author whom Mr. Dunlop has forgotten to notice. One of his 'Narrations' is the history of a Milesian who fled from home when Miletus was attacked by Harpagus, and deposited his money with a knavish banker at Tauromenium. When the latter is called before the tribunal, he attempts to evade his oath by practising the artifice detected by Sancho Panza in his well known judgment. Another Milesian tale may be discovered in the adventure of the Ionians, who bargained with the Milesian fishermen for the next cast of their nets; it proved to be a golden tripod. This unexpected good fortune gave rise to great contentions between the parties, which were not allayed until an embassy was sent to the oracle of Apollo, who advised them to present it to the wisest.' When the tripod was offered to Thales, he transferred it to another philosopher, who resigned it, in his turn. In this manner it passed from hand to hand, until it reached Solon, who unfolded the meaning of the oracle, and offered it to the god, as the true source of all wisdom.

The general wreck of ancient literature confines us to mere conjecture; but it may be well supposed that tales of broader humour were not neglected amongst such lovers of mirth as the Greeks.Was Esop, like Howleglas, the hero of a popular tale of this description? We are accustomed from our youth to view this shadowy personage, as in the picture gallery of Philostratus, surrounded by the animals to whom he has given speech and reason; yet he obtained as much popularity by his laughter-moving talents, as by his graver apologues. Lucian invests him with the office of jester in the Island of the Blessed; and Philocleon, when relating the arts by which the Athenian suitors sought to unwrinkle the brows of the popular judges, places the pranks of Esop in marked opposition to the fables, Οἱ δὲ λέγουσι μυθους ἡμῖν, οἱ δ ̓ Αισώπου τὶ γελοῖον.

In the prosecution of his plan, Mr. Dunlop has successively analyzed the elegant but nerveless amatory and pastoral romances of the later Greeks, the fragment of Petronius, and the magic tale of the philosopher of Madaura. We, however, must be allowed to take a leap over the intermediate ages, and, like the seven sleepers in the legend, to shut our eyes in Paganism, and open them in Christianity.

'Never in the annals of the human race did a greater change of manners take place than in the middle ages; and accordingly, we must be prepared to expect a prodigious alteration in the character of fictitious literature, which we have seen may be expected to vary with the manners it would describe. But not only was there a change in the nature

of

of the characters themselves, and the adventures which occurred to them, but there was a very peculiar style of embellishment adopted, which, as it does not seem to have any necessary connection with the characters or adventures which it was employed to adorn, has given to the historians of literature no little labour to explain. The species of machinery, such as giants, dragons, and enchanted castles, which forms the seasoning of the adventures of chivalry, has been distinguished by the name of Romantic Fiction; and we shall now proceed to discuss the various systems which have been formed to account for its origin.

Different theories have been suggested for the purpose of explaining the origin of Romantic Fiction in Europe. The subject is curious, but is involved in much darkness and uncertainty.

To the northern Scalds, to the Arabians, to the people of Armorica or Britanny, and to the classical tales of antiquity, has been successively ascribed the origin of those extraordinary fables, which have been "so wildly disfigured in the romances of chivalry, and so elegantly adorned by the Italian Muse."-vol. i. p. 129.

Ritson cannot be named without respect for his industry, and pity for the unfortunate irritability which placed him throughout his life in a state of bitter and unintermitted warfare-with beefsteaks and revelation ;-with Pinkerton and Snorro;—with his best friends and half the letters in the alphabet. But although his outrages may provoke a smile, he has ably pointed out the weaker parts of the Arabian and Gothic systems, as Mr. Dunlop calls them, of Percy and Warton. These fanciful writers were misled by the enthusiasm with which they advocated their opinions; but Ritson himself in some instances was equally blinded by his obstinacy. Mr. Ellis has assimilated to each other the theories which have been broached respecting Gothic architecture and Gothic fiction.' This may be followed up by a comparison between the objects themselves. Without incurring the charge of credulity, we can readily believe that although the fabric was raised by a Norman architect, with the product of his northern quarries, yet the form of many a pendant keystone, reticulated moulding, and indented battlement, may really have been influenced by the recollection of the presence-chamber of the Soldan, the mosque of Cordova, or the Alcazar of Segovia. Nor must it be forgotten that the clearest demonstration has been afforded that the groundplan and structure of the minster is to be found in the basilica; and that the massy pillars and Saracenic decorations are merely the adjuncts which have transformed its regular magnificence into lengthened aisles and solemn gloom.

The following observations succeed to a summary of Warton's highly coloured dissertation:

"But if we look in vain to the early Gothic poetry for many of those fables which adorn the works of the romancers, we shall easily find them in the ample field of oriental fiction. Thus the Asiatic romances and chemical

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chemical works of the Arabians are full of enchantments, similar to those described in the Spanish, and even in the French, tales of chivalry. Magical rings were an important part of the eastern philosophy, and seem to have given rise to those which are of so much service to the Italian poets. In the eastern Peris we may trace the origin of the European fairies in their qualities, and perhaps in their name. The griffin, or hippogriff, of the Italian writers, seems to be the famous Simurgh of the Persians, which makes such a figure in the epic poems of Sadii and Ferdusii.'-vol. i. p. 137.

-Somewhat of the tumidity of the eastern style appears to have passed into Warton, who could see nothing but splendour' and variety' and magnificence,'' delightful forests' and' palaces glittering with gold and diamonds' in the Arabian fictions. And Mr. Dunlop Wartonizes in his turn, when he thinks that the early framers of the tales of chivalry' owe to Arabian invention that magnificence and splendour, those glowing descriptions and luxu riant ornaments suggested by the enchanting scenery of an eastern climate,' (vol. i. p. 136.) and when, in another place, he affords us the following amusing and novel delineation of Asiatic manners.

The indolence peculiar to the genial climates of Asia, and the luxurious life which the kings and other great men led in their seraglios, made them seek for this species of amusement, and set a high value on the recreation it afforded. When an eastern prince happens to be idle, which he commonly is, and at a loss for expedients to kill the time, he commands, it is said, his Grand Vizier, or his favourite, to tell him a series of stories. Being ignorant, and consequently credulous, and having no passion for moral improvement, and little knowledge of nature, he does not require that they should be probable or of an instructive tendency it is enough if they be astonishing. Hence all oriental tales are extravagant, and every thing is carried on by prodigy. As the taste, too, of the hearers was not improved by studying the simplicity of nature, and as they chiefly piqued themselves on the splendour of their equipage, and the vast quantity of jewels and curious things which they could heap together in their repositories, the authors, conformably to this taste, expatiate with peculiar delight in the description of magnificence, of rich robes and gaudy furniture, costly entertainments, and sumptuous palaces.'-vol. iii. pp. 309–10.

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As we have never had the felicity of prostrating ourselves before the footstool of the asylum of the creation,' it is not without diffidence we venture to surmise, that had these been the usual pastimes of the Divan and the Musnud, both Europe and Asia would have enjoyed greater tranquillity. And ignorant' as the "Turks of the present day' may be, we have certain reasons, nevertheless, for suspecting, that if the present sultan had no better employment for the vizir, whose head happens just now to be on his shoulders, than the recital of the temptations of Santon Barfisa, the Austrian and the Russian would have begun, ere this, to execute