A LETTER BY MR. MAYHEW. 
541 
have indicated a book by at least the major portion of the 
title ; but here we have simply “ Blaine ,” as representing the 
particular work. If this was an accident, it was one of a most 
extraordinary nature. 
I, thus instructed, turn to the review. The first thing which 
strikes me, is its great length. The paper is by no means a 
large one ; when advertisements, &c., are extracted, it consists 
of about thirty-two columns. The 66 Review on Blaine” 
actually occupies nearly one tenth of the space at the com- 
mand of the editor for particular and general news, leaders, 
markets, intelligence provincial and metropolitan, &c. 
The length is evidently too extensive to be allowed to any 
contribution ; and, putting this and that together, the early 
date of my reception of a paper sent by post to me, the 
peculiar state of the paper I receive, the length of the article 
in question, and the nature of the sentence directing my at 
tention to it, I feel it impossible to arrive at any other con- 
clusion than that the review in question is the work of the 
editor of the paper, or of some person writing under his 
direction. Either way, the article is in equal bad taste ; it is 
contrary to English notions of propriety to forward an adverse 
review to the author of any work; exposure from a just critic 
is an employment to regret, not an occupation to triumph in. 
With the general opinions of the paper, I intend to have no 
dispute. I have written ; my book is before the public ; by 
publication, I have invited judgment, and I have no right to 
complain when it is against me. A critic, however, should be 
certain of his facts before he advances them ; he ought to pelt 
a writer with no dubious opinion ; he, above all, should be 
most careful not to found condemnation upon surmise. Mr. 
Barlow, or the writer he employs, speaks as though he learnt 
from the book, for the first time, that I once presided over an 
anatomical school. This is a pretence which, under the cir- 
cumstances, amounts to positive dishonesty ; there are posi- 
tions so high that suppression of truth is a crime, and to 
tamper with the right becomes an actual falsehood. Mr. 
Barlow must have known all my antecedents, for my course 
has unfortunately been too marked to escape observation. 
At the time of my dispute with him, some years ago, I had 
just ceased to be one of the teachers at the London Veteri- 
nary College, and at the servant of that institution his re- 
marks were evidently launched. Amidst the wholesale abuse of 
the author, Mr. Barlow, or the writer he employs, however, 
manages to bestow some unintentional praise upon my un- 
acknowledged work : 
“ The muscular nomenclature is preferable lo that in former use ; 
