“Believe me, your letters of suggestion were always welcome, and would still be so. If anything in my last note—which was somewhat hurried—seemed to be cast in the form of a reflection upon you, I hope that you will consider that I did not so intend it.
“I have neither the right nor the desire to impugn your reasons for seeking another channel of communicating with the public than such as B. and H. have been able to afford, and I do not think I implied anything to the contrary. It is for you to make the best market of your writings that you can; and although I may, as well as any other publisher, have my own view of what you should do, and what should be done for you, I am most far from wishing you to accept my view unconvinced, and I do not even offer it therefore.
“I honestly and earnestly wish you as thorough success as you can desire; and I hope that after you have put other publishers to the real test,—not of telling you what their brethren ought to do, but of themselves doing what they say should be done,—you will find as complete satisfaction from the general average of your next five or six years, as I am inclined to think you might derive from a consideration of a similar period just ending.
“Sincerely yours,
“H. M. Brummell.”
Solomon, in the enthusiasm of his love for his little sister, conjures up quaint fancies to embody his ardent longings to lavish gifts upon her. “If she be a wall, we will build upon her a palace of silver; and if she be a door, we will inclose her with boards of cedar.” So, if this correspondence with Mr. Brummell were the Sacred Scriptures, one would express his admiration by writing a commentary upon it. His especial appreciation would be given to the childlike innocence with which Mr. Brummell darts out of his path in pursuit of chimerical beetles, while admonishing me to remember that we are concerned with but a single bug. Nor would he refuse the meed of one melodious tear to the naïveté with which this complete letter-writer, in his first epistle, lays bare the mercenary motives of his correspondent, and, in the second, calmly affirms, as a corollary to his propositions, that he knows nothing about the matter. We are all aware that men do speak unadvisedly with their lips, but the unconscious sweetness of Mr. Brummell's admission is the peculiar gift of Heaven to Mr. Brummell. The learned commentator might not be able to throw any light upon the points which are obscure to Mr. Brummell; nor can the impartial historian furnish any clew to the mystery of the “strong box,” the “promising experiment,” and the “parvenu hawkers and peddlers,” so significantly mentioned. The present writer has no information on these points, and is inclined to believe that Mr. Brummell evolved them, as the German philosopher did the camel, from his moral consciousness.
But the question is not of sacred but profane literature, and we will not darken counsel by words without knowledge.
Until about the middle of March, this matter had not been mentioned to any one except Mr. Dane. Seeing the sea-change into something rich and strange, to which it was liable at the hands of the house of Brummell & Hunt, I thought it might be well to give my own version of it; and I spoke of it to some of those who were nearest me, and learned, as reported in a letter of April 18, to Mr. Dane: “A. was not much taken aback by the aspect of my affairs,—thinks they have only done by me as by others; if one is ‘up’ to such things, he makes his bargains; if he leaves it to them, he gets theirs, such as they are. A. has done just as I did, never said anything about it, and they pay what they choose. What they choose is twelve and a half cents on a dollar and a half book, and ten cents on a dollar and a quarter book. He says he has made some inquiries, and supposes he could get more elsewhere, but ‘O, he is rich!’ B. has ten per cent. written contract. —— says D. has the same. E., of his own accord, told a friend of mine that he did not think B. & H. were good publishers for authors, as they advertised so little, and had no agencies for pushing sales. I don't agree with that, for I would much rather a book would travel on its own merits. In fact, I have always especially rejoiced in that attribute of B. & H. A. says K. is shrewd and he has no doubt he is well paid. But what is the use of talking about it any more?“
MR. DANE TO M. N.
“To us mere mortals it seems as if you authors were—as the countryman told Arthur Gilman his lecture was—‘plaguey kinder shaller.’ That ... you should surrender yourself at discretion to some publisher is natural enough, but that A. should be systematically humbugged out of his dollars, and have the credit which I—and I presume mankind generally—gave him for exacting so much for his copyright as to make the price of his epistles and things extortionate, is, as the man said of his wife's death, ridic'lous. There is nothing in the last ‘Adriatic’ but ——'s poem. Tell him that the world thinks he imposes on us by making us pay a dollar and a half for his very thin books. We suppose he gets their weight in gold per copyright.”