Excerpt from Half-Hours With the Best American Authors, Vol. 2

William Dean Howells, who has recently risen into distinguished prominence as an American novelist of the first order of ability, is a native of Ohio, where he was horn in 1837. His works are somewhat wide in scope, embracing novels, travels, and poems. There are no more delicate bits of word-painting than some of the scenes in "Venetian Life" and "Italian Journeys," from the latter of which we offer a selection. These are among his earlier works. More recently his attention has been given to fiction, in which he has attained a position of great popularity. His method is to depict life as it actually exists, devoid of all romance, and wearing its every-day garb. Yet he has a shrewd insight into character, and analyzes it with effective clearness. He has written several plays and short character-dramas.

Pompeii is, in truth, so full of marvel and surprise that it would be unreasonable to express disappointment with Pompeii in fiction. And yet I cannot help it. An exuberant carelessness of phrase in most writers and talkers who describe it had led me to expect much more than it was possible to find there.

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