THE observer of things as they are may use them
in art sympathetically or satirically. He may
coin reality to pass current, or else to disgust
with life's counterfeits. In dealing with roguery
Thackeray best exemplifies the latter practice,
Borrow the former. Where Thackeray assails rascality, Borrow
condones it. He is the apologist of the Gypsies and the laureate
of vagabondism. He delights to study rogue characters, and
reflects that criminals are often creatures of circumstance. He
himself must be free as the wind, wandering forth or pitching
his tent at fancy's beck, now fashioning horseshoes in the dingle,
now exchanging confidences with the thievish apple-woman of
London Bridge, or the Romany chals and chies under a hedge.
He finds solace in compiling Newgate lives and trials. He
exalts the virtues of horseflesh, pugilism, and ale. He decries
respectability, -- the smugness of the priest, the gentility of Scott,
the unreal peddlerism of Wordsworth. His pride and intoler-
ance are aspects of an "unconquerable love of independence."
Although one of the most original of writers, he fears lest he
appropriate the ideas of others. Despite his acquaintance with
the picaresque novels of Spain, and his praise of " The English
Rogue" as "written by a remarkable genius," he proceeds with-
out reference to predecessors. He rediscovers on his own

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