At a distance from the pensive lady in sandals, is a ship under full sail; and on the beach is the figure of a small man, vainly essaying to roll over a huge bale of goods.
Equally divided at the top and bottom of this design, is the following title complete; but I fear the printer will not be able to give a facsimile:—
The Picture
of Liverpool:
or, Stranger’s Guide
and Gentleman’s Pocket Companion
FOR THE TOWN.
Embellished
With Engravings
By the Most Accomplished and Eminent Artists.
Liverpool:
Printed in Swift’s Court,
And sold by Woodward and Alderson, 56 Castle St. 1803.
A brief and reverential preface, as if the writer were all the time bowing, informs the reader of the flattering reception accorded to previous editions of the work; and quotes “testimonies of respect which had lately appeared in various quarters —the British Critic, Review, and the seventh volume of the Beauties of England and Wales”—and concludes by expressing the hope, that this new, revised, and illustrated edition might “render it less unworthy of the public notice, and less unworthy also of the subject it is intended to illustrate.”
A very nice, dapper, and respectful little preface, the time and place of writing which is solemnly recorded at the end-Hope Place, 1st Sept. 1803.
But how much fuller my satisfaction, as I fondly linger over this circumstantial paragraph, if the writer had recorded the precise hour of the day, and by what timepiece; and if he had but mentioned his age, occupation, and name.
But all is now lost; I know not who he was; and this estimable author must needs share the oblivious fate of all literary incognitos.
He must have possessed the grandest and most elevated ideas of true fame, since he scorned to be perpetuated by a solitary initial. Could I find him out now, sleeping neglected in some churchyard, I would buy him a headstone, and record upon it naught but his title-page, deeming that his noblest epitaph.
After the preface, the book opens with an extract from a prologue written by the excellent Dr. Aiken, the brother of Mrs. Barbauld, upon the opening of the Theater Royal, Liverpool, in 1772:—
“Where Mersey’s stream, long winding o’er the plain,
Pours his full tribute to the circling main,
A band of fishers chose their humble seat;
Contented labor blessed the fair retreat,
Inured to hardship, patient, bold, and rude,
They braved the billows for precarious food:
Their straggling huts were ranged along the shore,
Their nets and little boats their only store.”