I would not have written conjecturally on this subject if I could have avoided it; but though Swinney was a F.A.S. F.R.S., and though the work is dedicated to the Fellows of those Societies, no copy of it is to be found in the libraries of either, or in the British Museum. I cannot, therefore, be sure that my own copy is perfect. What that copy contains is thus set forth in half a dozen lines of introduction:
"Before I [S. S.] enter upon the more important part of my dissertation [The Explanation of the Apocalypse], it may not be improper to give you some account of the present state of the Seven Churches in Asia, as they are, which was communicated to me by a certain friend of mine, in the description of a short tour which he made through the principal parts of the Levant: should they be accompanied with a few casual notes of my own, I trust the work will not be less acceptable to you on that account."
It must be obvious, after this declaration, that the Tour set forth so conspicuously in the title-page, was not written by Swinney. Now the "Itinerary" which follows is advowedly "wrote by the author of the preceding account," and this brings the reader and the work itself to "The End!"
The truth I suspect to have been this:—Swinney was not prudent and was poor, and raised money occasionally, after the miserable fashion of the time, by publishing books on subscription, and receiving subscriptions in anticipation of publication.
About this time, from 1767 to 1769, he published a Sermon; The Ninth Satire of Horace, a meaningless trifle of a hundred lines, swollen, by printing the original and notes, into a quarto; a volume of Fugitive Pieces; and the first canto of The Battle of Minden, a Poem in three Books, enriched with critical Notes by Two Friends, and with explanatory Notes by the Author. Of the latter work, as of the Tour, I have never seen but one copy, a splendid specimen of typography, splendidly bound, containing the first and second canto. Whether the third canto was ever published is to me doubtful; some of your correspondents may be able to give you information. My own impression is that it was not, and for the following reasons.
Swinney, it appears, had received subscriptions for the work, and promised in his prospectus a plan of the battle, and portraits of the heroes, which the work does not contain. "However, to make some little amends" to his "generous subscribers," Swinney announces his intention to present them with "three books instead of one."
The first book is dedicated to Earl Waldegrave, who commanded "the six British regiments of infantry" on the "ever memorable 1st August, 1759," and a note affixed states that "Book the Second" will be published on 1st January, and "Book the Third" on 1st of August.
But the public, as Swinney says, were kept "in suspense" almost three years for the second book, which was not published until 1772; and in the dedication of this second book, also to Earl Waldegrave, Swinney says:
"Doubtless many of my subscribers have thought me very unmindful of the promise I made them in my printed proposal, in which I undertook to publish my poem out of hand. Ill health has been the sole cause of my disappointing their expectations. A fever of the nerves ... for these four years, has rendered me incapable.... In my original proposals I undertook to publish this work in two books. [In the introduction he says, as I have just quoted, one book.] Poetical matter hath increased upon me to such a degree, in the genial climate of Languedoc, as to have enabled me to compose several more books on this interesting subject, all which I purpose presenting my subscribers with at the original price of half a guinea.... Many months ago this Second Book was printed off; but on my arrival in town from Montauban (whither I purpose to return), I found there were so many faults and blunders in it throughout, that I was under the necessity of condemning five hundred copies to the inglorious purpose of defending pye bottoms from the dust of an oven.... Profit, my Lord, has not been my motive for publishing: if it had, I should be egregiously disappointed, for instead of gaining I shall be a considerable loser by the publication; and yet many of my subscribers have given me four, five, and six times over and above the subscription-price for my Poem. How even the remaining books will see the light must depend entirely upon my pecuniary, not my poetical abilities. The work is well nigh completed; but not one solitary brother have I throughout the airy regions of Grub Street who is poorer than I. It is not impossible, however, but when some of my partial friends shall know this, they may enable me by their bounty to publish out of hand."
This leads me to doubt whether the third book was ever published, for I think the most "partial" of his friends—those who had given "four, five, and six times over and above the subscription price"—must have had enough in two books. If it were not published, it is a curious fact that, in a poem called The Battle of Minden, the battle of Minden is not mentioned; though not more extraordinary perhaps than the omissions of the "Explanation of the Apocalypse" in his previous work.