CHAPTER VI.
LUCIAN AS A ROMANCE-WRITER.
We can readily see, from the spirit and vivacity of Lucian's Dialogues, what an admirable novelist he would have been; especially if he had chosen the style which has of late become deservedly popular, where nice delineation of character, and conversation of that clever and yet apparently natural and easy kind in which "the art conceals the art," form the attraction to the reader, rather than exciting incidents or elaborate plot. But this kind of literature had yet to be born. Lucian has left us, however, two short romances, if they may be so called, which it would be hardly fair to compare with modern works of fiction, but which show that he possessed powers of imagination admitting of large and successful development if his own age had afforded scope and encouragement to literary efforts of that kind. It must be remembered that the modern novel, in all its various types, is the special product of modern society; the love-tales which so largely form its staple, and the nice distinctions of character on which so much of its interest depends, spring entirely out of the circumstances of modern
