[In concluding the account of this very interesting circumnavigation, it is necessary to advert to a question of some importance in literature, as every question must be that involves the claims of authors and their respective titles to reputation. Nor is the public often impatient in listening to evidence on such subjects, if the merit contended for be sufficiently great to justify solicitude as to its being rightly conferred. That it is so in the case of the question, Who was the author of this work? no one can doubt, that is capable of relishing its excellencies; or is aware of the high rank it has always held among compositions of the kindthat its first reception was such as to take off four large impressions within a twelvemonththat it has been repeatedly printed since in a variety of formsand that it has been translated into most of the languages of Europe. The claimants are Mr Walter, chaplain of the Centurion, under whose name (as is mentioned in this volume of the Collection, p. 201,) it was originally, and, so far as the editor knows, always published; and Mr Benjamin Robins, an ingenious mathematician, and author of several works, much esteemed by men of science. A short statement of such information as the editor has been able to procure, is all that the limits of this work will permit to be said on the subject of this question. The public, being interested in what had been generally reported through the medium of the periodical publications, respecting the proceedings and fate of the squadron under Commodore Anson, had eagerly expected some account of this voyage drawn up under his notice, or authenticated by his approval. This anxiety, it is likely, was not a little enhanced by the circumstance of several small, but curious enough, narratives having been published of the distresses experienced by part of the squadron, especially the Wager; from which it was naturally enough inferred, that a judicious and minute account of the whole could not fail to gratify rational curiosity, and the common disposition to wonder. Mr Walter, accordingly, who had gone in the Centurion, the commodore's vessel, as chaplain, and who, it seems, had been in the habit of keeping memorials of the transactions and occurrences of the squadron, prepared materials for publication, and actually procured subscriptions for the liquidation of its expense. He brought down his narrative to the time of his leaving the Centurion at Macao, when he returned by another conveyance to England. But as the public expectation had been raised very high, some persons, it would appear, suggested that the materials intended to be published should be carefully examined, and, if need be, corrected, by an adequate judge of literary and scientific composition. Mr Robins, already well known as an author of both mathematical and political essays, and much valued by several distinguished characters of the times, was engaged to undertake this task, whether with or without the desire of Mr Walter, or under any allegation of that gentleman's known or reputed incompetency to fulfil the hopes entertained, cannot now be discovered. On examination, we are told, it was resolved that Mr Robins should write the whole work anew, and merely use the materials furnished by Mr Walter, or otherwise, as the particulars of wind, weather, currents, courses, &c. &c. usually given in a sailor's journal. The introduction, and several dissertations interspersed through, the work, are said, moreover, to have been written by Mr Robins without any such assistance whatever; but to what magnitude his labours throughout amounted, it is perhaps impossible to ascertain. That he acquired reputation by it is unquestionable; but that Mr Walter himself should not have contributed so much as to warrant his name appearing on the title-page of the book, and at its dedication to the Duke of Bedford, would require a proof of both want of talents and meanness of disposition, which no one yet has attempted to adduce. Mr Walter's character, indeed, seems to have been quite above either such deficiency; and, in all probability, was, both in point of firmness and moral and intellectual worth, the very circumstance which obtained for him the appointment to a responsible office in an expedition, which, in its origin, progress, and issue, attracted the peculiar regard of the British government, and the admiration of mankind in general. Besides this office, it may be mentioned, that in 1745, on his return from the expedition, he was made chaplain of Portsmouth dock-yard, in which situation he continued till his death on March 10th, 1785. The first edition of the work appeared in 1748; and a fifth being required in the following year, Mr Robins, it is said, revised it, and intended, had he remained in England, to have added a second volume. This rests on the assertion of Dr Wilson, who published Mr Robins' works after his death, in 2 vols. 8vo. 1761; and who, in the account of that gentleman's life prefixed, has been at pains to claim, in the strongest language, the merit of the Narrative for his friend. A passage or two from that memoir may satisfy the reader as to this part of the evidence, and as to the opinion of Dr W. one of the principal witnesses, respecting the proportional labours of Messrs Walter and Robins. "Upon a strict perusal of both the performances," says he, "I find Mr Robins' to contain about as much matter again as that of Mr Walterso this famous Voyage was composed in the person of the Centurion's chaplain, by Mr Robins in his own style and manner. Of this Mr Robins' friends, Mr Glover and Mr Ockenden, are witnesses as well as myself, we having compared the printed book with Mr Walter's manuscript. And this was at that time no secret, for in the counterpart of an indenture, now lying before me, made between Benjamin Robins, Esq. and John and Paul Knapton, booksellers, I find that those booksellers purchased the copy of this book from Mr Robins, as the sole proprietor, with no other mention of Mr Walter than a proviso in relation to the subscriptions he had taken." Dr Wilson evidently writes under some conviction that his assertions are liable to scrutiny, and that the matter of his remarks is debatable; hence his allegation that other friends of Mr Robins are witnesses as well as himself, and his insinuation that what he testifies was no secret. But it is obvious, that, were his own assertions of the fact at all questionable, he would be equally obnoxious to discredit in assigning these other witnesses; for clearly, the man who could falsify in the one case, would be capable of doing so in the other. This may be said without any impeachment whatever of either Dr Wilson or the other friends of Mr Robins. It is merely a remark on the mode of proof which the Dr has adopted. As to the insinuation again, of the fact being no secret, all that it may be requisite to say is simply this, that the circumstance of the existence of the counterpart of such an indenture as is mentioned, is a very indifferent proof of publicity; and that even were it otherwise, were it "confirmation strong," still it might be readily conceived that Mr Robins should be the sole proprietor of the work, and yet in no degree the author of it. One may believe, at least, that Mr Robins, having aided in drawing up the materials for publication, and having furnished some pieces for it, was entrusted with the disposal of it to the booksellers; Mr Walter himself, for value received; or other considerations, abandoning all further concern. Some importance has been attached to a letter from Lord Anson to Mr Robins, as preserved by Dr Wilson, and published, as he says, by his lordship's permission, or, to use his own expression, "Printed not without the noble lord's consent; who," says the doctor, "being requested to permit that this testimony might be exhibited to the world of his lordship's esteem for Mr Robins, replied, in the politest manner, That every thing in his power was due to the memory of one who had deserved so well of the public." That Mr Robins deserved well of the public was unquestionable, though he had not written a line of the Narrative. He had published several works on subjects of general utility; and, besides his private instructions in beneficial science, he had been employed officially in the service of his country: In short, he needed not any thing of the reputation of the author of the Narrative, whoever he was, to extend his own. But does the letter referred to, or the quotation now given respecting Lord Anson's permission to publish it, in any degree determine the question, or any thing connected with it? The Editor has a different opinion of it; he thinks it quite irrelevantthat it does not yield the least shadow of proof, that Mr Robins had any thing to do with the volume of the Narrative, already given to the public. All that can be legitimately inferred from it amounts to this, that Lord Anson, entertaining a high opinion of Mr Robins, and being much pleased with his works, was desirous that he should publish a second volume of the Voyage, and apprehended that he had abandoned the intention of doing so. Of the fact of Mr Robins being the author of what had appeared, or even of the existence of materials for a second volume in a state fit for the public noticeof any thing, in short, but an intention on the part of Mr Robins to this effect, the letter in question says not a word. Let the reader judge for himself. The letter is as follows:
"DEAR SIR,
"When I last saw you in town, I forgot to ask you, whether you intended to publish the second volume of my "Voyage" before you leave us; which, I confess, I am very sorry for. If you should have laid aside all thoughts of favouring the world with more of your works, it will be much disappointed, and no one in it more than your very much obliged and humble servant,
Bath, 22d October, 1749.
"ANSON."
"If you can tell the time of your departure, let me know it."
This letter is also preserved by Mr Nichols in his Literary Anecdotes of the 18th Century, vol. ii. page 206, where the Narrative is explicitly ascribed to Mr Robins, but not on, any particular evidence. The statement indeed that is there given seems founded on Dr Wilson's account of Mr Robins, without any other source of information having been consulted. The Encyclopædia Britannica is somewhat more candid, stating merely what was generally thought as to the Narrative being the work of Mr Robins, and at the same time pointing, though indirectly, to the existence of information opposed to that opinion. "In 1748," says the article Robins, 3d edition, "appeared Lord Anson's Voyage round the World, which, though Mr Walter's name is in the title, has been generally thought to be the work of Mr Robins.""The 5th edition, printed at London, in 1749, was revised and corrected by Mr Robins himself. It appears, however, from the corrigenda and addenda to the 1st volume of the Biographia Britannica, printed in the beginning of the 4th volume of that work, that Mr Robins was only consulted with respect to the disposition of the drawings, and that he had left England before the book was printed. Whether this be the fact, as it is asserted to be by the widow of Mr Walter, it is not for us to determine." The remark now made seems somewhat ambiguous, and may refer to either the 5th edition only, or to the work in general. In referring, however, to the Biog. Brit. as above, the ambiguity is removed, and a testimony is discovered in opposition to the statement of Dr Wilson, which the reader cannot fail to consider of very high import, and as bearing strongly against the claims of Mr Robins. The writers of the Biog. had spoken, in their account of Lord Anson, of the history of his voyage having been written by Mr Robins. This they did on common though uncontradicted report, arising in all probability from the positive assertions of Dr Wilson, to which, it is certainly very singular, neither Mr Walter nor any of his friends chose to object. With the most praise-worthy liberality and candour, however, these gentlemen, in the corrigenda; &c. referred to, insert the following notice:"Thus has the matter hitherto stood. But so late as the present year (1789) and a few days previously to the writing of this note, a letter upon the subject has been put into our hands by Mr John. Walter, bookseller at Charing Cross. It is addressed to that gentleman by Mrs Walter, the widow of the publisher of that Voyage, and is as follows:
"SIR,