Dunlop's _History of Prose Fiction_ had appeared in 1814, evidently a much more ambitious attempt than Scott's; but Scott could treat the British novelists with comparative freedom from the trammels of any established precedent.

Of course his position as one who had struck out a wonderful new path in the writing of novels gave to his reflections on other novelists a very special interest.

The _Lives of the Novelists_ are not to be neglected even now, and this is the more to be insisted on because the criticism of novels has been practiced with increasing zeal since Scott himself has become a classic and since his successors have made this field of literature more varied and popular, if not greater, than the first masters made it.

A recent writer on eighteenth century literature says: "By far the best criticism of the eighteenth century novelists will be found in the prefatory notices contributed by Scott to Ballantyne's _Novelists' Library_."[203] But the same writer adds: "Sir Walter Scott, indeed, considered _Fathom_ superior to _Jonathan Wild_, an opinion which must always remain one of the mysteries of criticism."[204] This comment indicates that there was no lack of assuredness in Scott's treatment, and we do indeed find a very pleasant tone of competence which, though liable to error as in the exaggerated praise bestowed upon Smollett, gives much of their effectiveness to the criticisms.

The quality appears elsewhere in Scott's critical work, but it is perhaps especially noticeable here.