It was his first attempt, after the briUiant success
of his Scotch noveb, to write a tale of purely Eng-
Ush Ufe. Three Feathers, which appeared serially
in the Cornhill Magq^zine during 1875, was certainly
not a failure ; but it cannot be said to have reached
the level of A Daughter of Heth or A Princess of
Thule, Cornwall has a romance of its own, but
it is a different romance from that of Black's native
country — ^as different as is the Cornish scenery from
that of the Hebrides. Black was an3rthing but will-
ing to regard himself as being what on the stage
is knoMm as a "one-part actor." He could describe
the coast of Cornwall with as fine a literary skill as
that which he devoted to the painting of the lochs

135



WILLIAM BLACK

of Skye or the islets of the far west. But some-
how or other he could not invest the new scenes
with the glamour which belonged to the old. The
men and women of the story were bright and taking,
clearly drawn, full of life, and attractive in their
sympathetic qualities, but they wanted the High-
land spirit with which Black was so thoroughly at
home; and, lacking this, they could not make so
strong an appeal to the reader as Leezibeth or the
King of Borva, to say nothing of Sheila, had done.
In spite, therefore, of his unwillingness to confine
his art to a single field. Black was convinced, after
writing Three Feathers, that it was Scots life and
character, and Scots scenery, that afforded the
widest scope to his peculiar talents.
It was in 1875 that William Barry's long illness
ended in his death.
To Wemyss Reid.
AiRLiE House,

Camberwell Grove,

Thursday.
