A Publisher and His Friends Part 51

_March_ 31, 1832.

MY DEAR SIR,

We shall have an opportunity of submitting the work to Count Orloff tomorrow morning, in case you can let me have a set of the proofs tonight, I mean as far as we have gone. I do not like to send mine, which are covered with corrections.

Yours truly, B.D.

_Mr. Disraeli to John Murray_. _Monday morning_, 9 _o'clock [April_ 2].

DEAR SIR,

Since I had the honour of addressing you the note of last night, I have seen the Baron. Our interview was intended to have been a final one, and it was therefore absolutely necessary that I should apprize him of all that had happened, of course concealing the name of your friend. The Baron says that the insertion of the obnoxious pa.s.sages is fatal to all his combinations; that he has devoted two months of the most valuable time to this affair, and that he must hold me personally responsible for the immediate fulfilment of my agreement, viz.: to ensure its publication when finished.

We dine at the same house today, and I have pledged myself to give him a categorical reply at that time, and to ensure its publication by some mode or other.

Under these princ.i.p.al circ.u.mstances, my dear sir, I can only state that the work must be published at once, and with the omission of all pa.s.sages hostile to Reform; and that if you are unwilling to introduce it in that way, I request from your friendliness such a.s.sistance as you can afford me about the printer, etc., to occasion its immediate publication in some other quarter.

After what took place between myself and my coadjutor last night, I really can have for him only one answer or one alternative, and as I wish to give him the first, and ever avoid the second, I look forward with confidence to your answer.

B.D.

Mr. Disraeli next desires to have a set of the proofs to put into the hands of the Duke of Wellington:

_Mr. Disraeli to John Murray_,

_April_ 6, 1832.

MY DEAR SIR,

I have just received a note, that if I can get a set of clean proofs by Sunday, they will be put in the Duke's hands preliminary to the debate.

I thought you would like to know this. Do you think it impossible? Let this be between us. I am sorry to give you all this trouble, but I know your zeal, and the interest you take in these affairs. I myself will never keep the printer, and engage when the proofs are sent me to prepare them for the press within an hour.

Yours,

B.D.

_Mr. Disraeli to John Murray_.

MY DEAR SIR,

I am very glad to receive the copy. I think that one should be sent to the editor of the _Times_ as quickly as possible; that at least he should not be antic.i.p.ated in the receipt, even if in the _notice_, by a Sunday paper. But I leave all this to your better judgment. You will send copies to Duke Street as soon as you have them.

B.D.

After the article in the _Times_ had appeared, Baron de Haber, a mysterious German gentleman of Jewish extraction, who had taken part in the production of "Gallomania," wrote to Mr. Murray:

_Baron de Haber to John Murray_.

2 _Mai_, 1832.

MON CHER MONSIEUR,

J'espere que vous serez content de l'article de _Times_ sur la "Gallomania." C'est un grand pas de fait. Il serait utile que le _Standard_ et le _Morning Post_ le copie en entier, avec des observations dans son sens. C'est a vous, mon cher Monsieur Murray, de soigner cet objet. J'ai infiniment regrette de ne m'etre pas trouve chez moi hier, lorsque vous etes venu me voir, avec l'aimable Mr. Lockhart.

Tout a vous,

DE H.

_Baron de Haber to John Murray_.

_Vendredi_.

MON CHER MONSIEUR MURRAY,

Vous desirez dans l'interet de l'ouvrage faire mentionner dans le _Standard_ que le _Times_ d'aujourd'hui paroit etre a.s.sez d'accord avec l'auteur de la "Gallomania" sur M. Thiers, esperant que de jour en jour il reviendra aux idees de cet auteur.

Il seroit aussi convenable de dire que la _prophetie_ dans la lettre a _My Lord Grey_ etait a.s.sez juste: Allusion--"In less than a month we shall no doubt hear of their _warm_ reception in the Provinces, and of some gratifying, perhaps startling, demonstrations of national grat.i.tude." Voyez, mon cher Monsieur, comme depuis 8 jours ces pauvres Deputes qui ont vote pour le Ministre sont traites, Si vous etes a la maison ce soir, dites-le-moi, je desire vous parler. Dinez-vous chez-vous?

Votre devoue,

DE H.

The following announcement was published by Mr. Disraeli in reply to certain criticisms of his work:

"I cannot allow myself to omit certain observations of my able critic without remarking that those omissions are occasioned by no insensibility to their acuteness.

"Circ.u.mstances of paramount necessity render it quite impossible that anything can proceed from my pen hostile to the general question of _Reform_.

"Independent however of all personal considerations, and viewing the question of Reform for a moment in the light in which my critic evidently speculates, I would humbly suggest that the cause which he advocates would perhaps be more united in the present pages by being pa.s.sed over _in silence_. It is important that this work should be a work not of _party_ but of national interest, and I am induced to believe that a large cla.s.s in this country, who think themselves bound to support the present administration from a superficial sympathy with their domestic measures, have long viewed their foreign policy with distrust and alarm.

"If the public are at length convinced that Foreign Policy, instead of being an abstract and isolated division of the national interests, is in fact the basis of our empire and present order, and that this basis shakes under the unskilful government of the Cabinet, the public may be induced to withdraw their confidence from that Cabinet altogether.

"With this exception, I have adopted all the additions and alterations that I have yet had the pleasure of seeing without reserve, and I seize this opportunity of expressing my sense of their justness and their value.

"_The Author of 'Gallomania_.'" [Footnote: Several references are made to "Contarini Fleming" and "Gallomania" in "Lord Beaconsfield's Letters to his Sister," published in 1887.]

The next person whom we shall introduce to the reader was one who had but little in common with Mr. Benjamin Disraeli, except that, like him, he had at that time won little of that world-wide renown which he was afterwards to achieve. This "writer of books," as he described himself, was no other than Thomas Carlyle, who, when he made the acquaintance of Mr. Murray, had translated Goethe's "Wilhelm Meister," written the "Life of Schiller," and several articles in the Reviews; but was not yet known as a literary man of mark. He was living among the bleak, bare moors of Dumfriesshire at Craigenputtock, where he was consoled at times by visits from Jeffrey and Emerson, and by letters from Goethe, and where he wrote that strange and rhapsodical book "Sartor Resartus," containing a considerable portion of his own experience. After the MS. was nearly finished, he wrapt it in a piece of paper, put in it his pocket, and started for Dumfries, on his way to London.

Mr. Francis Jeffrey, then Lord Advocate, recommended Carlyle to try Murray, because, "in spite of its radicalism, he would be the better publisher." Jeffrey wrote to Mr. Murray on the subject, without mentioning Carlyle's name:

_Mr. Jeffrey to John Murray_. _May_ I, 1831.

"Lord Jeffrey [Footnote: Jeffrey writes thus, although he did not become a Lord of Session till 1834.] understands that the earlier chapters of this work (which is the production of a friend of his) were shown some months ago to Mr. Murray (or his reader), and were formally judged of; though, from its incomplete state, no proposal for its publication could then be entertained. What is now sent completes it; the earlier chapters being now under the final perusal of the author.

"Lord Jeffrey, who thinks highly of the author's abilities, ventures to beg Mr. Murray to look at the MS. now left with him, and to give him, as soon as possible, his opinion as to its probable success on publication; and also to say whether he is willing to undertake it, and on what terms."

Carlyle, who was himself at the time in London, called upon Mr. Murray, and left with him a portion of the ma.n.u.script, and an outline of the proposed volume.

_Mr. Carlyle to John Murray_.