But we must remember that this encroachment on the dramatic province was exactly what was wanted to remove the reproach of fiction.

The inability to put actual conversation of a lively kind in the mouths of personages has been indicated as one of the great defects of the novel up to this time.

Except Cervantes, it is difficult to think of any novelist who had shown himself able to supply the want.

Bunyan can do it as few have done it even since his time.

The famous dialogue of Christian and By-ends is only the best--if it is the best--of scores nearly or quite as good.