There is throughout the whole the evidence of careful and conscious elaboration.
Hence, however lucid and free be the style of his romance, and though its flexibility and ease seem at first sight to have cost no trouble at all, yet its merit lies precisely in the fact that it succeeds in concealing the toil, in hiding the seams.

He could not have reached this perfection at a first attempt.

He must have worked long at the task, revised it again and again, corrected much, and added rather than cut away.

The aptness of form and expression has been arrived at by deliberate means, and owes nothing to chance.

Apart from the toning down of certain bold passages, to soften their effect, and appease the storm--for these were not literary alterations, but were imposed on him by prudence--one can see how numerous are the variations in his text, how necessary it is to take account of them, and to collect them.