If she were a woman throbbing with life, she would be different from Smollett's other heroines.

The "second lady" of the melodrama, Mademoiselle de Melvil, though by no means vivified, is yet more real than her sister-in-law.
The fact that they are mostly inanimate figures is not the only surprise given us by the personages of Count Fathom.

It is a surprise to find few of them strikingly whimsical; it is a surprise to find them in some cases far more distinctly conceived than any of the people in Roderick Random or Peregrine Pickle.

In the second of these, we saw Smollett beginning to understand the use of incident to indicate consistent development of character.

In Count Fathom, he seems fully to understand this principle of art, though he has not learned to apply it successfully.