Melville's specialty, "the weaving of sparkling fancies into a web of incident and fact"

This complimentary review of Melville's lecture on Statues in Rome is excerpted in the second volume of Jay Leyda's Melville Log at page [586]. But if you only have the old Melville Log, you won't know the Boston Evening Transcript called Melville "a pleasant bookmaker" whose forte is "the weaving of sparkling fancies into a web of incident and fact." Or that Melville's audience left persuaded of his "keen eye for the beautiful in art as well as in literature." Merton M. Sealts, Jr. cites the Boston Transcript review on page 23 of Melville as Lecturer, quoting the "pleasant bookmaker" bit without any mention of web-weaving.

Boston Evening Transcript - Thursday, December 3, 1857

MERCANTILE LIBRARY LECTURES. At the Tremont Temple, last evening, a large audience listened with evident satisfaction, to the description of the various sculptures of the Eternal City, by Herman Melville. The pleasant bookmaker proved himself as much at home in the lecture-room as in prosecuting his peculiar vocation, i.e., the weaving of sparkling fancies into a web of incident and fact—the result of extended observation and travel. The lecture contained many trenchant passages, similar to those which have made Mr. Melville’s works so highly prized by the large class whose literary appetite relishes only richly-flavored dishes. There was but one defect about the evening’s entertainment—the subject was too vast for an hour’s consideration; but enough was done, in the time allotted, to convince the auditory that the lecturer had a keen eye for the beautiful in art as well as in literature.

Mr. Melville will be succeeded, on Wednesday evening next, By George W. Curtis, Esq.

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