not respond to his feeling, and that presently she left London and
went to Paris, for her family was well-to-do, while Dickens was
living from hand to mouth.

In the second set of letters, written long afterward, Mrs. Winter
seems to have "set her cap" at the now famous author; but at that
time he was courted by every one, and had long ago forgotten the
lady who had so easily dismissed him in his younger days. In 1855,
Mrs. Winter seems to have reproached him for not having been more
constant in the past; but he replied:

You answered me coldly and reproachfully, and so I went my way.

Mr. Harper, in his introduction, tries very hard to prove that in
writing David Copperfield Dickens drew the character of Dora from
Miss Beadnell. It is a dangerous thing to say from whom any
character in a novel is drawn. An author takes whatever suits his
purpose in circumstance and fancy, and blends them all into one
consistent whole, which is not to be identified with any
individual. There is little reason to think that the most intimate
friends of Dickens and of his family were mistaken through all the
years when they were certain that the boy husband and the girl
wife of David Copperfield were suggested by any one save Dickens
himself and Catherine Hogarth.

Why should he have gone back to a mere passing fancy, to a girl
who did not care for him, and who had no influence on his life,
instead of picturing, as David's first wife, one whom he deeply
loved, whom he married, who was the mother of his children, and
who made a great part of his career, even that part which was