bable the fragment alluded to decided her sequel to the Simple Story.'

To throw her work so much into dialogue, as she has done, was, we should imagine, not so much the result of critical judgment as of professional bias; she was an actress, and her mind was stored with conversational oppositions of sentiment, and sallies of humour or character. We do not mean that judgment did not approve her course, suggested as it was by habit. Some great masters of romance have been led to prefer the dialogue form, as giving a smarter and more vivid glow to the business of their narrative; among whom, Richardson is unquestionably the most excellent. As his works are in the epistolary form, he has only to make his correspondents proud of the praise given to their fidelity of detail, and take care (no difficult matter) that the dialogue is at least as intelligent and interesting as the language of the modern stage. The characters in Richardson do the whole, either as speakers or reporters, and the author never in person appears to address the reader, though he is the father of all the minds which he brings into action. Mrs. Inchbald's plan allows her occasionally, as the author, "to point her moral and adorn her tale;”

and she avails herself with great skill of the combined advantages.

In the above observations, we have rather inclined to give the impression of a recent perusal upon our own minds, than the opinions of critics who wrote when the work first appeared. In those days, novels came into the short articles of the two great reviews, the Monthly and the Critical;' and the reading public was contented with less copious extracts, than it has now become the practice to make in even the Weekly Journals. But she had excited so much notice on the stage, as a respectable woman and a powerful dramatist, and had attracted so wide a circle of intelligent and zealous friends, that the Simple Story' made its way to every heart, and the author was ascertained to be one of the greatest ornaments of her sex.

VOL. I.

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CHAPTER XIII.

Publishes her novel-A second edition ordered-Fortune indeed smiles-All her Lottery-tickets Prizes-Increases her weekly income-Dr. Warren and his windows-The late Judge Hardinge -Mrs. Dobson Sir Charles Bunbury admires her work—' Nextdoor Neighbours' at Colman's-Thought of in her second novel -George Robinson buys her play-Mrs. Wells's irregularities— Pleasant excursions-“ Dieu et les Dames"-Goes to reside with a Mr. Shakespear-Fellow-lodger, General Martin-Kitty Fisher- The Wedding Day '—' Young Men and Old Women' -The Massacre,' a prose tragedy; some account of it-Deelines an offered engagement at Drury-Lane-Her family-The year 1792 passed cheerfully, at times happily.

DURING the year 1791 Mrs. Inchbald continued in her Frith Street lodgings, and was busily engaged in correcting the press of her romance; a business which we apprehend to be much less burthensome at present, than it formerly was, to the author, as the following will prove :-She frequently sat up at this work till three in the morning, through the bitter nights of January. On the 10th of February, Robinson published her work; and on the 1st of March a second edition

was ordered. While it was printing, for the first fortnight she passed nearly the whole of her time at Mr. Cooper's, the printer, to forward the reimpression; and then to the close, Miss Cooper was nearly as constantly with her, till the 6th of April, when it was ready for delivery. Fortune appears to be just now in the gayest humour with all her interests, "and gives her more than she dares ask;" for all her lottery-tickets prove to be prizes. She receives their value, and ventures to add four shillings in consequence to her weekly income. In this month she paid the printer, Cooper; but Mr. Robinson insisted upon repaying her. She lent thirty pounds to Mr. Marlow, who did not bring his newly-married wife to call upon her; and upon receiving a bank-note from Mr. Whitfield, she gratefully carried it to Dr. Warren, and pressed upon his acceptance. She was rendered melancholy by her visit. Lest the reader should conceive for a moment that she was sad to part with her money on this occasion, we, as faithful historians, are compelled to state that her self-love had been so happy in his skill, that she had transferred no slight portion of it to her able physician. If she hears but his name in company, she is delighted with the word; and she records her practice of continually walking up and down Sackville Street, where he lived, watching whether there were lights in his apartmentsfollowing his carriage about town, for the chance

of seeing him-and other extravagancies; which, as they promote health by brisk circulation, and cost nothing but the time of the pursuit, we shall not much censure, even at thirty-eight, whatever the prudes may do: though her stage friend Rosalind would certainly have "bestowed some good counsel," as she seems to have had "the very quotidian of love upon her."

Her Simple Story' gained for her the admiration and friendship of the late barrister, judge, and Shakspearian, George Hardinge, who corresponded with her in a mingled strain of gallantry and criticism, of which the progress of our narrative will exhibit the most amusing speci

Mrs. Dobson, the translator of the Mémoires pour servir à la Vie de Petrarch,' sent her recent work, 'A View of Human Life, translated from Petrarch, 1791,' with a letter, to Mrs. Inchbald; which she answered immediately, and in a few days called upon that lady, who presented her with an Æolian harp, and commenced an intimacy with her, which produced the most steady friendship of her whole existence-an introduction to Mr. Phillips of Pall-mall, surgeon to the King, his excellent lady, and their beautiful and interesting family. By her letters to this lady, we are able to trace her feelings and opinions through every variation of her subsequent life to its very close, as she seems to have sought upon every occasion the approbation of these her best