Mr. Munsell, pleased with his appearance and ingenuousness, hinted at the purchase of the manuscript, but the proposal being respectfully declined, inquired, if the writer undertook to sell the book himself, would he "stick to it." "Yes!" was the emphatic answer, "until everything is fully paid for."
The reply of Munsell was equally prompt and decisive: "I have never in all the years I have been in business published a work under such circumstances, but I will get that book out for you." Glazier thanked the worthy man, and expressed a hope that he would never have occasion to regret his generous deed; he would place the manuscript in his hands forthwith.
He then set out to solicit subscriptions for his work, and without prospectus, circular, or any of the usual paraphernalia of a solicitor—with nothing but his own unsupported representations of the quality of his projected book, succeeded in obtaining a very considerable number of orders. These he hastened to hand over to Joel Munsell, who was now confirmed in his good opinion of the writer, and the promising character of the venture.
Thus our young soldier-author was fortunate enough to find a publisher and a friend in need. A contract was drawn up, and feeling that his prospects were now somewhat assured, he ventured to write to his comrade, and late fellow-prisoner, Captain Hampton, of Rochester, New York, for the loan of fifty dollars. This sum was promptly sent him, and he at once handed it over to his publisher. Mr. R. H. Ferguson, late of the "Harris Light," also generously came forward to the assistance of his former comrade and tent-mate, and advanced him one hundred dollars to help on the work.
It may be stated here, that the friendship of Ferguson and Glazier dated from before the war, while the latter, a mere youth, was teaching school near Troy, in Rensselaer County, New York: that together, on the summons to arms, they enlisted in the Harris Light Cavalry; together went to the seat of war; that both fell into the hands of the rebels and had experience of Southern prisons; and that both effected their escape after the endurance of much suffering. Finally, their friendship and common career resulted in a business connection which was attended with considerable success, Mr. Ferguson having become the publisher of some of Captain Glazier's subsequent writings. Captain Frederick C. Lord, of Naugatuck, Connecticut, also contributed to Glazier's need, and enabled him by the opportune loan of twenty-five dollars to defray his board bill while waiting anxiously upon Munsell in the reading of proofs, and soliciting subscriptions in advance.
To return to the first work of our young author, now in the hands of Joel Munsell, of Albany, which was entitled "The Capture, Prison-Pen and Escape;" the first edition consisted of five hundred copies, which Glazier by his energy disposed of in a few days, handing over the proceeds to the publisher. At the end of six months he had called for several editions of his book, and sold them all through the instrumentality of solicitors selected by himself, some of them maimed soldiers of the war, paid Mr. Munsell in full, and had himself three thousand dollars in hand. Success is the mother of success.
Having prospered thus far beyond his expectations, he was anxious to add to his store. Visions of large sales over other territory than his native State of New York presented themselves to his eager mind; the book was purchased by the public as soon as it was published; reviewers spoke in enthusiastic praise of its merits. It was not a pretentious work—the author was simply a young man and a patriot. But passages of great beauty and of painful interest pervaded it, alternated with vivid descriptions of battles in which the writer had himself shared. A veteran author need not have been ashamed of many of its glowing pages. Lofty patriotism, heroic fortitude, and moral purity, characterized it throughout.
The account given of the sufferings of our soldiers while in the prison-pens of the South, and of his own and his comrades' while effecting their escape to the Federal lines, are so vividly portrayed, that our feelings are intensely enlisted in their behalf, and our minds wander to their dreary abodes—in thought sharing their sufferings and their sorrows.
Encouraged by his success in this new vocation our young author resolved, for the present at least, to postpone going to college, and devote himself to the sale of his book, by the simple agency before mentioned. This resolution cannot be considered surprising when we reflect upon the great amount of prosperity he had met with, and the prospect before him of attaining still greater advantage from a business upon which he had, by the merest accident, ventured. The college scheme was at length finally abandoned as the business continued to increase. "The Capture, Prison-Pen and Escape" ultimately reached the enormous sale of over four hundred thousand copies; larger by many thousands than that most extensively circulated and deservedly popular book, "Uncle Tom's Cabin," had ever attained to, inclusive of its sale in Europe.
The first book written and published by Willard Glazier is of a character to surprise us, when we consider the antecedents of the writer up to the date of its publication, December, 1865. Enlisting in the ranks of a cavalry regiment at the age of eighteen, during the exciting period of the civil war; a participant in many of its sanguinary battles; captured by the enemy and imprisoned under circumstances of the greatest trial and discouragement, his position and surroundings were not a very promising school for the training of an author. The book he produced is, in our judgment, not unworthy of comparison with the immortal work of Defoe, with this qualification in our author's favor that "Robinson Crusoe" is a fiction, while Glazier's is a true story of real adventure undergone by the writer and his comrades of the Union army.