Old
Auchinleck's saying of Cromwell, that "he gart kings ken they had a lith
in their necks," is a good example of really vivid phrase, suggesting the
axe and the block, and giving one of those dreadful hints to the
imagination which are more powerful than any amount of detail, and whose
skilful use is the only magic employed by the masters of truly
picturesque writing. The sentence just quoted will serve also as an
example of that tendency to _surplusage_, which adds to the bulk of Mr.
Masson's sentences at the cost of their effectiveness. If he had said
simply "chop on Tower Hill" (if chop there must be), it had been quite
enough, for we all know that the executioner's axe and the scaffold are
implied in it. Once more, and I have done with the least agreeable part
of my business. Mr. Masson, after telling over again the story of
Strafford with needless length of detail, ends thus: "On Wednesday, the
12th of May, that proud _curly_ head, the casket of that brain of power,
rolled on the scaffold of Tower Hill." Why _curly_? Surely it is here a
ludicrous impertinence. This careful thrusting forward of outward and
unmeaning particulars, in the hope of giving that reality to a picture
which genius only has the art to do, is becoming a weariness in modern
descriptive writing.
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