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CHAPTER X.

HIS MASTERPIECE.

The Reality of Fiction. -David Copperfield.-Opinion of Fraser's Magazine.The Shipwreck.- Uriah Heap. - Little Em'ly. - A Lone, Lorn Creetur.

"The gnashing billows heaved and fell;

Wild shrieked the midnight gale;

Far, far beneath the morning swell

Were pennant, spar, and sail."

O. W. HOLMES.

"There is sorrow on the sea."-JER. xlix. 23.

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SENSIBLE writer in "The Christian Examiner" for September, 1863, discusses the utility and moral effect of the drama and the novel; and, according to his method of argument, Charles Dickens was a benefactor to the readers of "David Copperfield," and to those who have witnessed the touching drama of "Little Em'ly," founded upon the same.

The story-telling and the story-reading propensity are utterly indestructible; and the following passages from that excellent article on "The Reality of Fiction" show where lies the danger in the literature of the imagination:

"This ever-increasing enlargement of the domain of that imaginative literature which already exists, or is to be given to the world, refutes all the fears and lamentations about its decay and disappearance; as if it were to be submerged and lost under the flooding sweep of a despotic and universal utilitarianism; as if He who made the soul would allow its finest and most delicate powers to lie dormant, and rust out; as if, under the. Providence which arrays the lilies, piles up the splendors of ever-changing cloud-scenery, flashes across the north and up to the zenith the mystic brilliancy of the aurora, bends the rainbow-hues of hope, and garlands our daily bread with flowers, as if, under this Providence, so prodigal in dispensations of beauty, and ever revelling in infinite forms of grace, man will be suffered to degenerate into a worshipper of machinery, and an idolater of the golden calf.

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"When the parables are stricken from the Bible, when the story of Joseph ceases to be told, and David's lyrics are no longer chanted, then the curtain will fall upon the last drama, and the poet sing his last note to the deaf, and the novelist write his last romance for the blind. The realm of imagination to be annihilated! — why, it came into existence when order came out of chaos, and was in the joyous song the morning stars sang together. All races and all climes have colonized it. It is the realm of the spirit, wherein the spirit often lives its purest life, gets its sweetest expression, and

learns to transfigure the drudgery of the work-day world. It shares the spirit's immortality, and can never cease to be."

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"David Copperfield" is one of the greatest of the novels of Dickens. A writer in "Fraser's Magazine for December, 1850, indicates the opinion of the English concerning it. He says, "This, the last, is, in our opinion, the best of all the author's fictions. The plot is better contrived, and the interest more sustained, than in any other. Here there is no sickly sentiment, no prolix description, and scarcely a trace of exaggerated passion. The author's taste has become gradually more and more refined: his style has got to be more easy, graceful, and natural. The principal groups are delineated as carefully as ever; but, instead of the elaborate Dutch painting to which we had been accustomed in his backgrounds and accessories, we have now a single vigorous touch here and there, which is far more artistic and far more effective. His winds do not howl, nor his seas roar, through whole chapters, as formerly: he has become better acquainted with his readers, and ventures to leave more to their imagination. This is the first time that the hero has been made to tell his own story, a plan which generally insures something like epic unity for the tale. We have several reasons for suggesting that here and there, under the name of 'David Copperfield,' we have been favored with pas

sages from the personal history, adventures, and experiences of Charles Dickens. Indeed, this conclusion is in a manner forced upon us by the peculiar professions selected for the ideal character, who is first a newspaper-reporter, and then a famous novelist. There is, moreover, an air of reality pervading the whole book, to a degree never attained in any of his previous works, and which cannot be entirely attributed to the mere form of narration. . . . David Copperfield the younger was born at Blunderstone, near Yarmouth, there is really

a village of that name. We do not know whether Charles Dickens was born there too: at all events, the number and minuteness of the local details indicate an intimate knowledge of and fondness for Yarmouth and its neighborhood."

The only quotation from "David Copperfield" which will be given here is that portion where the wreck is described in language which will call up similar sights to many dwellers by the sea:

"It was broad day, - eight or nine o'clock; the storm raging in lieu of the batteries, and some one knocking and calling at my door.

"What is the matter?' I cried.

"A wreck, close by!'

"I

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sprung out of bed, and asked, What wreck?'

"A schooner from Spain or Portugal, laden with

fruit and wine. Make haste, sir, if you want to see her! It's thought, down on the beach, she'll go to pieces every moment.'

"The excited voice went clamoring along the staircase; and I wrapped myself in my clothes as quickly as I could, and ran into the street.

"Numbers of people were there before me, all running in one direction, to the beach. to the beach. I ran the same

way, outstripping a good many, and soon came facing the wild sea.

"The wind might by this time have lulled a little, though not more sensibly than if the cannonading I had dreamed of had been diminished by the silencing of half a dozen guns out of hundreds. But the sea, having upon it the additional agitation of the whole night, was infinitely more terrific than when I had seen it last. Every appearance it had then presented bore the expression of being swelled; and the height to which the breakers rose, and, looking over one another, bore one another down, and rolled in in interminable hosts, was most appalling.

"In the difficulty of hearing any thing but wind and waves, and in the crowd, and the unspeakable confusion, and my first breathless efforts to stand against the weather, I was so confused, that I looked out to sea for the wreck, and saw nothing but the foaming heads of the great waves. A half-dressed boatman standing next me pointed with his bare arm (a tattooed arrow on

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