The lack of reserve made Dickens "slop over" occasionally,
as indelicate critics have put it; and the presence of reserve did more
than any other one thing to give Thackeray the reputation for perfect
style which all concede to him.
One of the most famous passages in all of Thackeray's works is the
description of the battle of Waterloo in "Vanity Fair," ch. XXXII:
All that day, from morning till past sunset, the cannon never ceased to
roar. It was dark when the cannonading stopped all of a sudden.
All of us have read of what occurred during that interval. The tale is
in every Englishman's mouth; and you and I, who were children when the
great battle was won and lost, are never tired of hearing and recounting
the history of that famous action. Its remembrance rankles still in the
bosoms of millions of the countrymen of those brave men who lost the
day. They pant for an opportunity of revenging that humiliation; and if
a contest, ending in a victory on their part, should ensue, elating them
in their turn, and leaving its cursed legacy of hatred and rage behind
to us, there is no end to the so called glory and shame, and to the
alternation of successful and unsuccessful murder, in which two
high-spirited nations might engage.
Pages:
215
216
217
218
219
220
221
222
223
224
225
226
227
228
229
230
231
232
233
234
235
236
237
238
239