AUDUBON’S LETTERPRESS AAS 
advertisement of Audubon’s work, “price 25s. in royal 
octavo, cloth, Ornithological Biography. ...” If the 
desire of these various editors were to cripple the work 
of the American naturalist, their efforts were certainly 
vain, for he was able to make his way against all com- 
petitors. Brown’s work was a failure, so few copies 
having been distributed that it is doubtful if more than 
one ever came to this country, and only one is known 
to be in possession of any large library in England. 
Audubon’s initial volume of the Biography was well 
received and drew forth immediate and unstinted praise 
from many sources. He was anxious that MacGillivray 
should contribute some account of it to the London 
Quarterly Review, then under the editorial manage- 
ment of John Gibson Lockhart, but his suggestion was 
coldly received and drew forth the following declara- 
tion of independence from his able, if as yet undistin- 
guished, coadjutor: ® 
With respect to the review, I can only say that if Mr. 
Lockhart is so doubtful as to my powers, he may doubt as 
long as he lists. I shall not submit any essay of mine to his 
judgment. If you had informed me that he or the conductor 
of my other review would print a notice of your works, I should 
have agreed to write one with pleasure, but under existing cir- 
cumstances I shall not, it being repugnant to my feelings and 
contrary to my practice and principles to sue for favor with 
any man. I have already written three reviews of your books 
which have been printed, and when I am applied to for a 
fourth I shall write it too, with ‘“‘an elegance of style, a power 
of expression, and knowledge of the subject” equal to those 
usually displayed by the editor of the Quarterly. 
8See Ruthven Deane (Bibl. No. 209), The Awk, vol. xviii (1901). 
The extract is from a letter dated “Edinburgh, 22 Warriston Crescent 7th 
May, 1831.” 
