leaving Paris he visited the Netherlands and Holland, returning to Luneville late in the following year. The duke now appointed him his librarian, but the post was one of honor rather than profit, for the duke was wretchedly poor. On the death of Leopold in 1729, his successor, Francis Stephen, made an addition of two hundred livres to Duval's stipend, and, what was even better, paid it punctually. Soon after he bestowed on him the appointment of professor of history, antiquities, and ancient and modern geography in the Academy of Luneville. It was with difficulty that Duval was induced to accept this appointment. He yielded at last, and set strenuously to work to make his lectures worthy of approbation, and with such decided success that in a little while he had so many private pupils that he could count on a clear annual gain of four thousand livres. Among his hearers was William Pitt, afterward Earl of Chatham, then a youth upon his travels, but who displayed such talents that his future greatness was more than once predicted by Duval.

Duval's simple habits enabled him to amass a considerable fortune out of his income, and the first use he made of it was to discharge what he considered a debt of gratitude. He rebuilt, in a handsome style, the hermitage of St. Anne, and added to it a chapel and an extensive piece of land. Part of this land he directed to be laid out as a nursery for fruit-trees of the best kind. For this benefit, the only return that he required was that the hermits should gratuitously supply the neighborhood for three leagues round with the produce of the nursery, and should go themselves to plant the trees whenever their assistance was wanted. During the remainder of his life he displayed the same interest in the hermitage, regarding it as the gateway through which he had passed to fortune and distinction.

In 1743, after many changes in the duchy of Lorraine, Duval was called to Vienna by the Grand-duke, husband of the celebrated Maria Theresa, and in the Austrian capital he spent nine months, returning, after that time, to Florence, where his old patrons now resided. Beneath the soft skies of Italy his time glided away happily, passed, for the most part, in studying, cultivating a small garden, and making occasional journeys to Rome and Naples. In the Eternal City all his old love of the antique revived, and he began to form a cabinet of ancient medals. In 1748 he received a summons from his royal master to take up his residence at

Vienna. Francis, then Emperor of Germany, was forming a cabinet of coins, and desired that Duval should take charge of it. The appointment was much to his liking, and he devoted himself to its duties with the greatest assiduity. The simplicity and natural independence of his character endeared him to the royal household; he was received as a friend, and had no irksome ceremonies imposed on him. The entire confidence of the emperor and empress was manifested in the following year by their offering him the honorable situation of sub-preceptor to the young Archduke Joseph. Duval, however, declined to accept it, on the ground that the immethodical manner in which he had pursued his own studies rendered him unfit for dictating a course to others. Duval persisted in his refusal to accept the post proffered to him, and his sincerity induced his patrons to withhold their entreaties without withdrawing any of their friendship. That the latter was genuine is illustrated in the following anecdote, which we hope is authentic: One day, a foreigner, who had a letter of introduction to Duval, was in vain attempting to find him in the labyrinth of the palace, when he was accosted by a person, who said, "Come with me, and I will show you the way." After many turnings and windings, the person opened the door, and called out, “Duval, I have brought somebody to see you." This obliging guide was the emperor. On another occasion the empress displayed an equal contempt of ceremonious forms. It was Carnival time, and there was to be a grand masked ball. The empress invited Duval to her apartment, and prevailed upon him to assume the garb of a Turkish dervis, having previously made a wager with the emperor that there would be a character at the ball whose incognito he could not penetrate. "Come, Duval," she said, gayly, "I hope you will at least dance a minuet with me.” “I, your majesty !" exclaimed he; "in my native woods I never learned any thing more graceful than turning heels over head." The empress laughed heartily; they entered the ballroom, and, though the emperor did his best to discover who was the dervis, he lost his wager.

In 1752 Duval was forced to suspend his literary and antiquarian labors. Intense application had made serious inroads on his health, and his physicians advised a tour. He traveled through various parts of Germany and the Netherlands, and then visited Paris, where he met with a hospitable reception from all the lit

erary characters of the day. On his return he passed through his native province of Champagne, and availed himself of many opportunities of showing a kindly remembrance. In Lorraine, also, he rebuilt the hermitage of St. Joseph de Messui, originally erected by the founder of St. Anne's, and which was now inhabited by the hermit who had first taught him the rudiments of reading and writing.

The remainder of his days were passed blamelessly amid books, medals, conversations, correspondences, and other kindred occupations. Duval was the author of various numismatic cataloguesworks requiring an unusual amount of exact antiquarian knowledge; also of three volumes of letters and fragments, and two unpublished works-the one a treatise on medals, the other a philosophical romance. He remained in firm health until his eightieth year, when he was attacked with a painful disease which overthrew his hearty constitution, and brought him to the brink of the grave. He rallied for a while, but the shock proved too severe, and on the third of November, 1775, he died, in the eightyfirst year of his age. By his will he left the interest of eleven thousand florins to be divided yearly, as a marriage portion, among three poor young girls of Vienna; a pension to a widow, with whom he had boarded; and annuities to his servant and a deserted child, whom the servant had found in the street and taken under his protection.

In the minds of a good many excellent critics this illustrious gentleman represents the genius of modern fiction. A structure of wonderful comprehensiveness and beauty is upheld on his brawny shoulders, and future generations, they say, will point to it as to the mighty ruins of the Parthenon, saying here is a guide and a study. A writer so curiously varied and fresh as Mr. Dickens provokes naturally a vast amount of exaggerated admiration. The most discreet find it difficult to assign him a place. He shoots out so strangely in every direction, and yet possesses such a wonderful power of concentration, that we are always liable to say too much or too little of his powers. One thing is certain, the world has produced but few men of Mr. Dickens's calibre. He belongs incontestably to the same order of genius as Shakspeare, Fielding, and Sir Walter Scott. It would not be utterly absurd to say that in some particulars he is superior to either of these illustrious officers of the legions of literature, nor would it be difficult to prove that in many things he is their inferior. The best established fact that can be mentioned, and one which bears

its own significance, is that he has given a distinctive character to the age in which he wrote. It has been Mr. Dickens's pleasant task to originate a peculiar kind of fiction, and his good fortune to create the appetite for it. We say a peculiar kind of fiction because an analysis of his works displays the fact that he never touches the bad without making us grieve for its badness, never whispers the truth without making us glory in its triumph. With a sensibility which is almost divine he searches out the hidden springs of charity and refreshes us with their genial flow before we well know that we have been touched with the rod of the magician. No human creature ever was or ever will be so vile but good-will in some shape clings about his heart; whether it be for man, or beast, or inanimate thing, it is there, and Mr. Dickens, with his witty springes, his pathetic pitfalls, his eloquent lunges, his humorous shafts, is sure to take it captive, and once in his glowing embrace escape is impossible until what is good becomes better. The secret of Mr. Dickens's enormous popularity is to be found in this circumstance. We all think we are very good creatures, and Mr. Dickens makes us feel that we are becoming better. It is a pleasant thought, and travels from pole to pole of constituted society.

Mr. Charles Dickens is now (1858) in his forty-sixth year, having come into this world, which he has much comforted with his genial genius, on the 15th of February, 1812, at Landport, Portsmouth. His father was employed at the time in the naval establishment, and, when the war ceased, was rewarded with a pension, on which, like a sensible man, he retired. Being a person of considerable talent and education, he gravitated naturally to London, and soon after, feeling the lack of some kind of employment, and perhaps finding his half-pay insufficient for metropolitan life, obtained a situation to report the debates in Parliament for the "Chronicle," on the staff of which paper he continued for several years.

Concerning the early education of Mr. Charles Dickens we have no information. It was his father's wish that he should adopt the law as a profession, and it is said that the future novelist was actually articled to an attorney, but for how long he devoted his attention to Blackstone and Chitty we know not. From an early period his inclinations were to the press, and he set himself to the task of learning short-hand in order that he might the more