Author : Baronesse de La Motte Beach 1923 LONDON: PRINTED FOR G. AND W. B. WHITTAKER, AVE-MARIA-LANE. MDCCCXXIV. PREFACE. "THE OUTCASTS" is the production of the Baroness de la Motte Fouquè; and is decidedly a copy of the Scotch Romances, but this, though detracting in some measure from the writer's originality, cannot at all affect her powers of amusement with the reader; indeed, it would be well for the Northern literature if the imitation of these excellent models were to become more general; they might infuse into it a portion of health which it certainly wants at present, い and teach the German Romancers to substitute historic character and sound thinking for the cant of mysticism and sentiment. As it is, their characters are not the characters of life; they are nothing but metaphysical visionaries, the mere spawn of insanity working upon dulness, and when they do act, which is seldom, for their element is talking, their actions are as little like humanity as can well be imagined. It matters not to what class they may belong, or in what situations they may be placed; they take no colour from outward circumstances, but are alike mystics or sentimentalists, with a desperate determination of saying fine things wher there is least occasion for such vanities. One is always inclined to apply to them Falstaff's excellent advice to Pistol De -"Deliver your news like a man of this world." ઃ |
