LITERARY AND DOMESTIC LIFE. 2G5 



will send something. I hope I shall have the pleasure of hearing 

 from you very soon, and I am, my dear sir, yours very truly, 



" W. Blackwood." 



" Saturday Morning, September 20, 1823. 

 " My dear Sir : — Before coming home last night I got all to 

 press, so that I will he ahle to send you a complete copy of the 

 Number with this, by the mail to-day. You will, I hope, find it a 

 very good one, and though not equal in some respects to No. 79, 

 it is superior in some others. On Wednesday morning I did not 

 expect to have got this length, nor to have had it such a number. 

 By some mistake I did not get back from Mr. L[ockhart] till Wed- 

 nesday afternoon the slips of O'Doherty on Don Juan and Timothy 

 Tickler. Not hearing from you or him on Tuesday morning, I 

 made up Doubleday's 'Picturesque'* Avith Crewe's 'Blunt,'f and 

 'Bartlemy Fair,' by a new correspondent, whom I shall tell you 

 about before I have done ; and not knowing how I might be able 

 to make up the Number, I put in Mr. St. Barbe's 'Gallery,' J and 

 'The Poor Man-of-War's Man,' both of which had been in tyj>es 

 for three or four months. There being no time to lose, I got these 

 four forms to press ; I wish now I had waited another day, and kept 

 ' The Man-of-War's Man,' but still I hope it will pass muster, and I 

 hope you will read it without prejudice. You will naturally be say- 

 ing, Why did I not, when run in such difficulty, make up and put 



to press your articles on , and the Murderers ? Here I am 



afraid you will blame me, but first hear me. When I first read 

 your terrible scraping of I enjoyed it excessively, but on see- 

 ing it in types, I began to feel a little for the poor monster, and 

 above all, when I considered that it might perhaps so irritate the 

 creature as to drive him to some beastly personal attack upon you, 

 I thought it better to pause. I felt quite sure that if published in 

 its present state, he would be in such a state of rage, he would at 

 all events denounce you everywhere as the author. This would be 

 most unpleasant to your feelings, for now that one can look at the 

 article coolly, there are such coarseness and personal things in it as 

 one would not like to hear it said that you were the author of 



* Art. Lin the Number. 



t Art. II. a review of Blunt's Vestiges of Ancient Manners, dbc. 



X Art. IV. " Time's Whispering Gallery." 



11* 



