the thunder of the torrent, which was seen to foam along the bottom was scarcely heard to murmur.  Over these crags rose others of stupendous height and fantastic shape; some shooting into cones; others impending far over their base, in huge masses of granite, along whose broken ridges was often lodged a weight of snow, that, trembling even to the vibration of a sound, threatened to bear destruction in its course to the vale.  Around on every side, far as the eye could penetrate, were seen only forms of grandeur the long perspective of mountain tops, tinged with ethereal blue, or white with snow; valleys of ice, and forests of gloomy fir. * * * The deep silence of these solitudes was broken only at intervals by the scream of the vultures, seen cowering round some cliff below, or by the cry of the eagle sailing high in the air; except when the travellers listened to the hollow thunder that sometimes muttered at their feet.[202]

Lewis in “The Monk,” and Maturin in “The Family of Montorio,” carried the principles of the Radcliffe school beyond the verge of absurdity.  Their novels are wild melodramas, the product of distorted imaginations, in which endless horrors are mingled with gross violations of decency.  “The Monk” and “The Family of Montorio” had a great reputation in their day, and in contemporary criticism we find their praise sung and their immortality predicted.  But, while they illustrate, on the one hand, the temporary vogue an author may acquire by highly-wrought clap-trap and flashy flights of imagination, they show very plainly, in the oblivion which has overtaken them, how little such characteristics avail in the race for enduring fame.

[Footnote 201:  “The Mysteries of Udolpho,” chap. xix.]

[Footnote 202:  “The Mysteries of Udolpho,” ch. iv.]

V.

At the end of the eighteenth century, the novel had become established as a popular form of literature, and the number of its votaries had begun to assume the proportions which have since made novelists by far the most numerous literary body.  Some writers, perhaps, have been omitted who deserved mention as much as some who have been commented upon.  But all have been spoken of, it is believed, who contributed any new ideas or methods to the art of fictitious composition.

The novel had, indeed, taken the place of the stage to a very great extent.  If we compare the productions of the dramatist with those of the novelist, as regards both quantity and merit, during the last hundred and fifty years, we shall perceive a great preponderance in favor of the writer of fiction.  Although there are some respects in which the novel cannot compete with the drama, there are obvious reasons why the former should be much better adapted than the latter to modern requirements.  Great changes have come over the audience.  With the progress of civilization, life has become less and less dramatic, and affords fewer striking scenes and violent ebullitions of passion.  It not only furnishes far less material for stage effects, but also supplies little of that sympathy which the dramatist must find in the minds of his audience.  While life has become less dramatic, it has become far more complex, and requires a broader treatment in its delineation than the restrictions of the stage can allow.