“Mr. Disraeli never in his life required or received any remuneration for anything he ever wrote, except for books bearing his name.
“Mr. Disraeli never was editor of the Star Chamber, or any other newspaper, journal, review, or magazine, or anything else.”
To return, however, to legitimate book-publishing. About this time Campbell’s old scheme of “Biographies of the Poets” was revived, re-appearing under the title of “Specimens of the British Poets;” and Murray was so pleased with the work that he made the stipulated sum of £500 into double that amount. To Allen Cunningham, too, he gave £50 per volume additional for his “Lives of the British Artists,” and made the payment retrospective.
We could repeat five hundred anecdotes of his liberal and kindly generosity, but our space only permits us to record another, which it is very pleasant to read about.
It was twenty-two years since the obscure Fleet Street bookseller had embraced the “glorious and profitable” opportunity of taking a fourth share in “Marmion,” and since then Sir Walter Scott had achieved an unparalleled position in the world of English letters, had written innumerable works, and had earned unheard-of sums—and had been completely ruined. With the aid of his creditors, Scott was now seeking to recover all his copyrights for a final edition of his collected works. All had been bought back save this fourth share of “Marmion.” Lockhart was commissioned by his father-in-law to inquire on what terms the share might be re-purchased, and this was Murray’s immediate reply:—
“Albemarle Street, June 8th, 1829.
“My dear Sir,—Mr. Lockhart has this moment communicated your letter respecting my fourth share of the copyright of ‘Marmion.’ I have already been applied to by Messrs. Constable and Messrs. Longman to know what sum I would sell this share for; but so highly do I estimate the honour of being, even in so small a degree, the publisher of the author of this poem, that no pecuniary consideration whatever can induce me to part with it.
“But there is a consideration of another kind, which until now I was not aware of, which would make it painful to me if I were to retain it longer. I mean the knowledge of its being required by the author, into whose hands it was spontaneously resigned in the same instant that I read his request.
“The share has been profitable to me fifty-fold beyond what either publisher or author could have anticipated, and, therefore, my returning it on such an occasion, you will, I trust, do me the favour to consider in no other light than as a mere act of grateful acknowledgment, for benefits already received by
“My dear Sir,
“Your obliged and faithful Servant,
“John Murray.”
This noble act, we must remember, was performed at a time when the future was anything but bright, or at all events when the present was dismally gloomy. “Lydia Whyte,” writes Tom Moore, “told me that Murray was very unsuccessful of late. Besides the failure of his Representative, the Quarterly did not look very promising, and he was about to give up the fine house he had taken in Whitehall, and return to live in Albemarle-street.”
Constable had, some years previous, hit upon the idea of appealing to a public that should be numbered, not by tens of thousands, but by hundreds of thousands, ay, and by millions! and had just commenced his “Miscellany.” Murray, quick to receive a good idea, started at once into competition with his “Family Library,” Lockhart commencing the series with a “Life of Napoleon” and the “Court and Camp of Bonaparte.” Cunningham followed with his “Lives of the British Painters,” and Southey revised his “Life of Nelson,” and expanded another review article into a “Life of Wellington,” on terms equally munificent with the other.
Cheap editions of Byron were multiplied by the score; Landor received a thousand guineas for his “Journals of African Travel,” and Napier another thousand for his first volume of the “History of the Peninsular War.” If Murray neglected opportunities, he generally managed to retrieve them. He might have had the “Bridgewater Treatises;” and he says, “The ‘Rejected Addresses’ were offered me for ten pounds, and I let them go by as the kite of the moment. See the result! I was determined to pay for my neglect, and I bought the remainder of the copyright for 150 guineas.” Murray might have added that he generously gave the Smiths a handsome share in the ultimate profits.
Sometimes, too, he had the sagacity to buy the failures as well as the successes of other publishers. Constable produced a little “History of England,” in one small volume, which fell still-born from the press. Murray purchased it for a trifle, re-christened it with his usual happiness, and as “Mrs. Markham’s History of England” the work has been an annual source of revenue to the house, as the present Mr. Murray’s last trade sale list would tell us.