Roundabout Papers - Penn State University

Roundabout Paperswithout the suspicion of flattery or detraction. I shallsay nothing of his military accomplishments, which theopposite reports of his friends and enemies among thesoldiers have rendered problematical. Those malignerswho deny him personal valor, seem not to consider thatthis accusation is charged at a venture, since the personof a general is too seldom exposed, and that fearwhich is said sometimes to have disconcerted him beforeaction might probably be more for his army thanhimself.” If Swift could hint a doubt of Marlborough’scourage, what wonder that a nameless scribe of our dayshould question the honor of Clyde?THE LAST SKETCHNot many days since I went to visit a house where informer years I had received many a friendly welcome.We went into the owner’s—an artist’s—studio. Prints,pictures, and sketches hung on the walls as I had lastseen and remembered them. The implements of thepainter’s art were there. The light which had shone uponso many, many hours of patient and cheerful toil, pouredthrough the northern window upon print and bust, layfigure and sketch, and upon the easel before which thegood, the gentle, the beloved Leslie labored. In thisroom the busy brain had devised, and the skilful handexecuted, I know not how many of the noble workswhich have delighted the world with their beauty andcharming humor. Here the poet called up into pictorialpresence, and informed with life, grace, beauty, infinitefriendly mirth and wondrous naturalness of expression,the people of whom his dear books told him314