ABSTRACT
At this holiday season, in books and newspapers, on stage and in drawing-room, the poet and the painter, the author, the actor, and the dramatist compete with one another to bring before young and old scenes and suggestions of beauty, heroism, purity, and truth. One writer is an exception. MARK TwAIN sets himself to show the seamy side of the legendary Round Table of King ARTHUR's time. He depicts all the vices of feudalism-the licentiousness of the nobles, their arrogance and insolence to the middle classes, their neglect of the poor, their hours of gluttony and idleness, varied by raids and brawls and riotous disorders. He describes how a Yankee visiting the Court uses modern inventions, defeats the best warriors, and redresses the wrongs of the poor. It is quite possible that a serious purpose underlies what otherwise seems a vulgar travesty. We have every regard for MARK TWAIN-a writer who has enriched English literature by admirable descriptions of boy life, and who in The Pri11cc m1d the Pt~ttpcr has given a vivid picture of media:val times. A book, however, that tries to deface our moral and literary currency by bruising and soiling the image of King ARTHUR, as left to us by legend and consecrated by poetry, is a very unworthy production of the great humourist's pen. No doubt there is one element of wit-incongruity-in bringing a Yankee from Connecticut face to £.1ce with feudal knights; but sharp contrast between vulgar facts and antique ideas is not the only thing necessary for humour. If it were, then a travelling Cockney putting a flaming tie round the neck of the 'Apollo Belvidere,' or sticking a clay pipe between the lips of the 'Venus de Medici,' would be a matter-of-
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factMARKTwAIN,andasmuchentitledtorespect.Burlesqueand t.ravcstyarcsatirebroughtdowntothemeanestcapacity,andthey havetheirproperprovincewhenpretentiousfalsehoodsputonthe masksofsolemnityandtruth.Stiltedtragedies,artificialmelodramas, unnaturalacting,arcproperlyhelduptoridiculeonthestageorin parodies.ThemannerismsofapopularwriterlikeCARLYLE,DROWNING,orevenTENNYSON,may,throughcaricature,begood-humourcdly exposed;butanattackontheidealsassociatedwithKingARTHURisa coarsepanderingtothatpassionforirreverencewhichisatthebasisof agreatdealofYankccwit.Tomakeajestof£1cts,phrases,orwordsScriptural,heroic,orlegendary-thatarcheldinaweorreverenceby othermenistheopenpurposeofeverywitlingonaWesternprint, whoendeavourstofollowinthefootstepsofARTEMUSWARD,DRET HARTE,andMARKTWAIN.Theymayfinallybesuccessfulenoughto destroytheirowntrade.Theynowlivebyshockingdecentpeople whostillretainlovefortheDible,HoMER,SHAKESPEARE,ScoTT,and TENNYSON;butwhentheyhavethoroughlytrainedarisinggeneration torespectnothingtheirirreverencewillfallflat.
