FORSTER'S LIFE OF CHARLES DICKENS.* THIS "Memorial Edition" is worthy
of the occasion which has called it forth. The life was published in 1871-3, appear- ing in three successive volumes; an edition to a certain extent acvised came out somewhat later, and has been here reprinted. Mr. Matz tells us that he has "resisted the temptation to load it with notes," and that his work has been to "fully illus- trate the text with pictorial comment and elucidation." We do not question the soundness of his judgment. Nevertheless .a well-annotated edition would be welcome. Carlyle compared the book to Boswell's Johnson, and this, as we all know, has been made more valuable and interesting to present-day readers by a succession of commentators beginning with Sir John Hawkins. There is a note, for instance, on the Christmas Carol (published December, 1843) which gives us "a curiosity of literature." It came out a few days before Christmas ; we have changed that to " a few months " for Imoks of this class. Then the cost is not a little surprising. An edition of 6,000 cost more than £800 to produce. Things have changed not a little to make the cheap literature of to- .day possible. The speciality, then, of the " memorial edition " is in the illustrations. The Dickens cult, as shown in the institution of the "Dickens Fellowship" and the publication of the Dickensian, has made this possible. Indeed, nearly as many more pictures were available if there had been room for them. We have portraits of the people with whom Dickens had to do, or who were simply contemporaries, representations of arouses which he inhabited and places which he saw, reproduc- tions of his manuscripts and of the play-bills of his theatrical performances. Of course all are not equally relevant, but there are none which we should wish away. Possibly it might have been better to give 'half a dozen facsimiles, identical in size, of handwriting at various periods of life rather than the • The Life of Charles Dickens. By John Forster. With E00 Protraits, de. Collected, arranged, and annotated by B. W. Matz. 2 yobs. London: Chapman gnd Hall, 125s. net.] thirty-six "reduced facsimiles " which we have. We want to- know what his "copy" actually looked like to the people who had to deal with it. Possibly, too, if we were to be shown something of the Highland scenery through which he passed in the tour of 1841, one landscape would have given us a better idea, than the six miniatures which face p. 164 of vol. i But, on the whole, we are more than content with whah Mr. Matz has given us.
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