This I could not bring myself to undertake, without first seeing the interlocutors face to face, and looking into their eyes, and hearing them laugh together "like a rhinoceros," or like the chorus in "Der Freischütz." Though I knew Wilson, and Lockhart, and Hogg, and "Old Christopher," and "O'Doherty," and "Timothy Tickler," and "Ebony," by reputation, it was only as a company of shadows, and not as creatures of substantial flesh and blood. The lightning had struck; my guns were in position; I had got the range of the enemies' camp, and meant to be in no hurry, but "to fight it out on the line" I had chosen, if it took me till doomsday. I refused, therefore. I was willing to wait. I knew, to be sure, the Chinese could grow oranges from the seed in half an hour; but then the oranges were peas, and I wanted to grow "some pumpkins." In short, I would not
"wear
My strength away in wrestling with the air."
Next he wanted me to write a review of "Margaret Lyndsay," a charming story by Wilson himself, of which I had incidentally expressed the highest opinion, in our correspondence. Mr. Blackwood sprang at the idea, like a half-famished pickerel at a frog. But no. Although such a paper would be quite in my way, for I have always delighted in showing off, and teaching grandmothers to suck eggs, I could not be persuaded, for reasons which may be guessed at by the proud and sensitive and foolish, so long as the question about "Brother Jonathan" was undecided.
On the 24th of November, having received my answer to his of the 8th, he wrote again as follows:—
"My dear Sir,—I felt very anxious, indeed, till I had the pleasure of receiving your letter of the 11th, fearing that you might not, perhaps, take the remarks I sent you in the spirit of kindness in which they were honestly and sincerely made. Your letter has satisfied me that you will yet make a glorious book of 'Brother Jonathan.'
"Let the better feelings and passions of our nature have freer scope and happier development and results. This is what your work wants; for mankind like better to see the bright side of the picture than the dark one. I do not think it necessary to say one word more to you on the subject. Your own taste and feelings must direct you as to what is necessary to be done. All that I hope and pray for is, that you may have set seriously to work with the revision and correction."
Are not these two extracts enough to show of themselves the leading characteristics of "Ebony," or "Old Christopher"? How business-like, and yet how friendly and judicious are the suggestions!
Meanwhile, I had furnished a paper for him, entitled "Men and Women; or, A Brief Hypothesis concerning the Differences in their Genius." My object was to show, that, although unlike, they were not unequal; that each had a standard for itself. I did not urge that Arabs, who are reckoned pretty good judges of horse-flesh, always give the preference to mares for endurance and swiftness,—that the female bird of prey is larger and fiercer than the male,—that the female body-guard of the King of Dahomey are terrible Amazons,—nor that, where women reign, men rule, and vice versâ; but that, by endowing woman with a more sensitive organization, our Father had given her what was better than a mane for the lioness, a beard for the goat, or a voice and plumage to the female singing-bird, etc., etc. This also appeared, and was handsomely paid for.
"In this number," he says, "you will see, that, though we have given an additional half-sheet, we have only had room for your 'American Writers.'... I hope you are going on with the series; and that you do not dwell more than is necessary upon the Poetæ Minores, whom no one cares about. This is what has sometimes been objected to your articles; and among other remonstrances I have received, I extract the following from the letter of a gentleman for whom I have a great respect. He says your article contains 'misstatements, and some of them of a mischievous tendency; but what mostly concerns you to know is the odium which is likely to be thrown on your Magazine, in America at least, by the manner in which (from malice or blundering) some meritorious individuals are dealt with, who have every claim to the shelter of private life.'"
As the meddling gentleman from whose letter the passage was taken did not particularize, all I could do in reply, and that I lost no time in doing, was to give him the lie direct, and offer my name to the publisher. I called for specifications and proof, which never came; and have an idea that the writer was an artist—a great coxcomb—of whom I had spoken too well, on paper, though not well enough to satisfy his inordinate vanity.