It is like a huge, strange, gorgeous flower,
an exaggeration and intensification of such flowers as we know; but a
flower without roots, unique, never to be reproduced. It is fitting that
its portrait should be painted; but, once done, it is done with; we cannot
fill our picture-gallery with it. Carlyle wrote the History of the French
Revolution, and Bret Harte has written the History of the Argonauts; but
it is absurd to suppose that a national literature could be founded on
either episode.
But though Mr. Harte has not left his fellow-craftsmen anything to gather
from the lode which he opened and exhausted, we may still learn something
from his method. He took things as he found them, and he found them
disinclined to weave themselves into an elaborate and balanced narrative.
He recognized the deficiency of historical perspective, but he saw that
what was lost in slowly growing, culminating power was gained in vivid,
instant force. The deeds of his character could not be represented as the
final result of long-inherited proclivities; but they could appear between
their motive and their consequence, like the draw--aim--fire! of the
Western desperado,--as short, sharp, and conclusive.
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