paragraph of "The Return," perhaps the most dazzling feat of impressionism
in modern English? The _Athenæum_ says also: "Upon the whole, we do not
think the short story represents Mr. Conrad's true _métier_" It may be
that Mr. Conrad's true _métier_ was, after all, that of an auctioneer;
but, after "Youth," "To-morrow," "Typhoon," "Karain," "The End of the
Tether," and half a dozen other mere masterpieces, he may congratulate
himself on having made a fairly successful hobby of the short story. The
most extraordinary of all the _Athenæum's_ remarks is this: "The one ship
story here, 'The Brute,' makes us regret that the author does not give us
more of the sea in his work." Well, considering that about two-thirds of
Mr. Conrad's work deals with the sea, considering that he has written
"Lord Jim," "The Nigger of the _Narcissus_" "Typhoon," "Nostromo," and
"The Mirror of the Sea," this regret shall be awarded the gold medal of
the silly season. If the _Athenæum_ were a silly paper, like the
_Academy_, I should have kept an august silence on this ineptitude. But
the _Athenæum_ has my respect. It ought to remember the responsibilities
of its position, and ought not to entrust an important work of letters to
some one whose most obvious characteristic is an exquisite and profound
incompetence for criticism. The explanation that occurs to me is that "A
Set of Six" and "Diana Mallory" got mixed on the _Athenæum's_ library
table, and that each was despatched to the critic chosen for the other.

* * * * *

"A Set of Six" will not count among Mr. Conrad's major works. But in the
mere use of English it shows an advance upon all his previous books. In
some of his finest chapters there is scarcely a page without a phrase that
no Englishman would have written, and in nearly every one of his books
slight positive errors in the use of English are fairly common. In "A Set
of Six" I have detected no error and extremely few questionable terms. The