How many thousand never heard the nameOne was irresistibly reminded, in their society, of these lines of old Daniel; or of the comfortable self-classification of another Frenchman, M. Vestris, the dancer, who always maintained that there were but three really great men in Europe—Voltaire, Frederick II., and himself. We talk about small places as being Little Pedlingtons, but it sometimes seems as if the Great Pedlingtons were the smallest, after all, because there is nobody to teach them humility. Little Pedlington at least shows itself apologetic and even uneasy; that is what saves it to reason and common-sense. But fancy a Parisian apologizing for Paris! The great fear of those who demand an intellectual metropolis is provincialism; but we must remember that the word is used in two wholly different senses, which have nothing in common. What an American understands by
Of Sidney or of Spenser, or their books?
And yet brave fellows, and presume of fame,
And think to bear down all the world with looks.
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importance to the universe appeared to beset these young gentlemen:—
Boston, Lee and Shepard Publishers, 1892.
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