THE
ENGLISH
NOVEL,
18001829:
UPDATE
3 (June 2002May 2003)
Peter Garside, with
Jacqueline Belanger, Sharon Ragaz, Anthony Mandal
This project report relates to The English
Novel, 1770–1829: A Bibliographical Survey of Prose Fiction
published in the British Isles, general editors Peter Garside,
James Raven, and Rainer Schöwerling, 2 vols (Oxford: OUP, 2000).
In particular it offers fresh commentary on the entries in the
second volume, which was co-edited by Peter Garside and Rainer
Schöwerling, with the assistance of Christopher Skelton-Foord
and Karin Wünsche. The present report is the third Update in
what is intended to be a series of annual Reports, each featuring
information that has come to light in the preceding year as
a result of activities in CEIR and through contributions sent
by interested individuals outside Cardiff.
The entries below are organised in a way that
matches the order of material in the English Novel, 1770–1829.
While making reference to any relevant changes that may have
occurred in Updates 1 and 2, the ‘base’ it refers to is the
printed Bibliography and not the preceding reports. Sections
A and B concern authorship, with the first of these proposing
changes to the attribution as given in the printed Bibliography,
and the second recording the discovery of new information of
interest that has nevertheless not led presently to new attributions.
Section C includes three additional titles which match the criteria
for inclusion and should ideally have been incorporated in the
printed Bibliography, while the last two sections involve information
such as is usually found in the Notes field of entries,
and those owning copies of the printed Bibliography might wish
(as in the case of the earlier categories) to amend entries
accordingly. An element of colour coding has been used to facilitate
recognition of the nature of changes, with red
denoting revisions and additions to existing entries in the
Bibliography, and the additional titles discovered being picked
out in blue. Reference numbers
(e.g. 1806: 12) are the same as those in the English Novel,
1770–1829; when found as cross references these refer back
to the original Bibliography, unless accompanied with ‘above’
or ‘below’, in which case a cross reference within the present
report is intended. Abbreviations match those listed at the
beginning volume 2 of the English Novel, though in a
few cases these are spelled out more fully for the convenience
of present readers.
This report was prepared by Peter Garside,
with significant inputs of information from Drs Jacqueline Belanger
and Sharon Ragaz, on this occasion especially as a result of
their trawls through (respectively) the Longman Letter Books
and Blackwood Papers. Additional information was provided by
Dr Anthony Mandal, who was also responsible for preparing the
report in its final form via the Cardiff Corvey website.
Information was also generously communicated by a number of
individuals, notably: Professors Rolf Loeber and Magda Stouthamer-Loeber,
from Pittsburgh University, and Timothy Killick at Cardiff University.
As previously the Cardiff team has benefited from its association
with Projekt Corvey at Paderborn University, most recently through
the joint preparation of a Bibliography of Fiction, 1830–1836
(also included in Issue 10 of Cardiff Corvey). Thanks
are also due to Michael Bott, of Reading University Library,
for help received in locating materials in the Longman archives;
and to the trustees of the National Library of Scotland [NLS]
for permission to quote from manuscripts in their care.
A: New and Changed Author
Attributions
1820: 7
[DRISCOLL, Miss].
NICE DISTINCTIONS: A TALE.
Dublin: Printed at the Hibernia Press Office, 1, Temple-Lane
for J. Cumming 16, Lower Ormond-Quay; and Longman, Hurst, Rees,
Orme, and Brown, London, 1820.
vii, 330p. 8vo. 10s 6d (ECB, ER).
ER 33: 518 (May 1820), 34: 263 (Aug 1820).
Corvey; CME 3-628-48223-2; ECB 413; NSTC 2N7355 (BI BL, C, Dt,
O).
Notes. Preface to ‘Jedediah Cleishbotham’, dated Dublin,
30 Sept 1819. A review in the Dublin
Magazine, 1 (May 1820), ends with the following short paragraph:
‘We now take our farewell of D—l’s NICE DISTINCTIONS;
but we sincerely hope that we may again see characters as nicely
distinguished as this work promises’ (p. 378). The copy
of the novel in Trinity College, Dublin, has a pencil annotation
identifying the author as ‘Miss Driscoll’.
1822: 10
[?HACK, Mrs William].
REFORMATION: A NOVEL. IN THREE VOLUMES.
London: Printed for Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, and Brown, Paternoster-Row,
1822.
I 362p; II 303p; III 333p. 12mo. 18s (ECB, ER).
ER 38: 522 (May 1823); WSW II: 30.
Corvey; CME 3-628-48523-1; ECB 484; NSTC 2R5611 (BI BL, C).
Notes. A draft letter to William Hack of 1 Aug 1822 in
the Longman Letter Books reads: ‘On the other side you have
the opinion of our literary friend respecting the Novel you
sent us. As it is the first production of the Author we requested
our friend to go into detail & if she will make the proposed
alterations, we shall be happy to see the MS again, when it
is very likely we shall engage in the publication. The MS is
forwarded by this nights coach’ (Longman I, 101, no. 311A).
The letter is addressed to Hack at Market
St., Brighton. The Longman Divide Ledger
entry for this novel indicates a balance due to ‘Mrs Hack’ of
£7. 8. 6 (dated 1 Feb 1825): this points to the likelihood that
Reformation was the work of the wife or a female relation
of William Hack. It might even be possible to attribute the
novel to Maria Barton Hack (1777–1844), a prolific writer of
children’s literature, though her first work, Winter Evenings:
or Tales of Travellers, appeared in 1818. Mention of the
present item being ‘a first work’ is made in another letter
to William Hack, evidently later in 1822, sending further recommendations
from the reader and returning the MS (no. 296B).
1823: 20
[?Ashworth, John Harvey or
?FRENCH, Augustus].
HURSTWOOD: A TALE OF THE YEAR 1715. IN THREE VOLUMES.
London: Printed for Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, Brown, and Green,
Paternoster-Row, 1823.
I v, 241p; II 250p; III 218p. 12mo. 16s 6d (ECB, ER).
ER 39: 512 (Jan 1824); WSW II: 42.
Corvey; CME 3-628-47753-0; ECB 290; NSTC 2A17728 (BI BL, C,
O; NA DLC, MH).
Notes. Dedication to Archer Clunn, Esq. of Griffynhavel, dated
Hallcar, County of Radnor, June 1823. Attributed
to Ashworth in H&L and generally in catalogues and bibliographies.
However, a letter of 12 Sept 1823 addressed to the Revd. Augustus
French in the Longman Letter Books, concerning terms, makes
no mention of any other author: ‘Agreeably to my promise I have
examined the MS of “Hirstwood” [sic] and the house is
willing to engage in the speculation on the terms I explained
to you—namely, that the house should be at the expense &
risk of Paper, Printing &c &c and that the profits of
the first & future editions be divided equally with the
author—you will please to inform me if the terms are agreed
to, as the Work should appear as early as possible’ (Longman
I, 101, no. 381A) The letter is addressed to French at Westbury,
near Bristol. It is also perhaps significant that other works
commonly attributed to Ashworth were published in the 1850s
or later.
1825: 2
[O’DRISCOL, John].
THE ADVENTURERS; OR, SCENES IN IRELAND, IN THE REIGN OF ELIZABETH.
IN THREE VOLUMES.
London: Printed for Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, Brown, and Green,
Paternoster Row, 1825.
I iv, 341p; II 321p; III 322p. 12mo. 21s (ER, QR).
ER 42: 514 (Aug 1825), 43: 356–72 (Feb 1826) full review; QR
32: 549 (Oct 1825).
Corvey; CME 3-628-47021-8; NSTC 2A4376 (BI C, E, O).
Notes. Identified as O’Driscol’s
through a sequence of letters in the Longman Letter Books. In
a letter to J. O’Driscol Esq of 14 June 1823, the firm
state: ‘We shall be happy to publish the Tale to which you allude
on the plan upon which we publish your work on Ireland, dividing
the profits of every edition’ (Longman I, 101, no. 369). That
the ‘tale’ relates to the above novel is evident from a sequence
of other letters from Longmans written to the widow and her
representatives after the author’s death. In the last of these,
to a Mr N. Vincent, Owen Rees on 31 Oct 1829 writes: ‘we will
thank you to pay her the inclosed £60, taking a proper receipt,
stating it to be a settlement in full for all the Interest of
the said John O’Driscol in “Views of Ireland” “The Adventurers”
& “The History of Ireland” first edition’ (I, 102, no. 106D).
O’Driscol’s other works include Views
of Ireland, moral, political, and religious (1823) and The
History of Ireland (1827), both of which were published
by Longmans. This is one of four novels which are together
given full reviews in ER (Feb 1826) under the page-top heading
‘Irish Novels’.
1825: 15
[DODS, Mary Diana].
TALES OF THE WILD AND THE WONDERFUL.
London: Printed for Hurst, Robinson, and Co. 5 Waterloo-Place,
Pall Mall; and A. Constable and Co. Edinburgh, 1825.
x, 356p. 8vo. 10s 6d (ECB).
WSW II: 53–4.
Corvey; CME 3-628-51167-4; ECB 576; NSTC 2B41787 (BI BL, C,
O; NA DLC, MH).
Notes. Dedication to Joanna Baillie. Wolff’s
proposal (vol. 1, p. 111; Item 601) of Dods, a friend
of Mary Shelley and a contributor to Blackwood’s Magazine,
as an alternative solution to the contested issue of George
Borrow’s authorship of this work, finds incontestable support
in two sources. In two letters to William Blackwood, of 16 and
5 May 1825, David Lyndsay discusses details of the work as its
author (NLS, MS 4015, ff. 27, 29). David Lyndsay in turn is
identified as a pseudonym of Mary Diana Dods by Betty T. Bennett
in her Mary Diana Dods, A Gentleman and a Scholar (New
York: William Morrow and Company, 1991), where this collection
of tales is discussed directly as Dods’s own (see pp. 23, 64–8).
ECB dates Oct 1825.
Further edn: Philadelphia 1826 (NSTC).
1827: 29
[CROWE, Eyre Evans].
VITTORIA COLONNA: A TALE OF ROME, IN THE NINETEENTH CENTURY.
IN THREE VOLUMES.
Edinburgh: William Blackwood, and T. Cadell, London, 1827.
I 278p; II 247p; III 252p. 12mo. 18s (ECB, QR); 18s boards (ER).
ER 46: 534 (Oct 1827); QR 36: 603 (Oct 1827).
Corvey; CME 3-628-48919-9; ECB 616; NSTC 2E1362 (BI BL, C, O;
NA DLC, MH).
Notes. The arguments of Wolff (I,
323) for attributing this title to Crowe, as opposed to Charlotte
Anne Eaton, finds substantial support in the Blackwood Papers,
where letters between Crowe and Blackwood directly relating
to the composition and production of the novel are found between
Mar 1825 and June 1827 (see NLS, MSS 4014, 4106, 4019). In the
last of these, Crowe complains that ‘[t]he second title […]
is rather aping Constable’s Rome in the 19th Century’ (MS 4019,
f. 65), this itself alluding to Charlotte Anne Eaton’s successful
travelogue, Rome in the Nineteenth Century, first published
by Archibald Constable & Co in 1820. Confusion caused by
the two titles offers the most likely explanation of why Eaton’s
name became associated with this novel at all.
Further edn: German trans., 1828.
1828: 4
[?CHALKLEN, Charles William
and/or ?CHALKLEN, Miss].
THE HEBREW, A SKETCH IN THE NINETEENTH CENTURY: WITH
THE DREAM OF SAINT KENYA.
Edinburgh: Printed for W. Blackwood, and T. Cadell, Strand,
London, 1828.
viii, 232p. 12mo. 5s 6d (ECB).
Corvey; CME 3-628-51037-6; ECB 262; NSTC 2H15773 (BI BL, E,
O).
Notes. Pp. [221]–232 contain ‘The Dream of Saint Kenya’
(poem). Surviving letters in the Blackwood
papers indicate that the author was either the Revd Charles
William Chalklen or his sister. In the first of these, dated
5 Sept 1827, Chalklen urges William Blackwood for a response
to manuscripts sent: ‘It is odd I shd not yet have heard from
you anything of ye “Hebrew” now in your hands—at least in your
house. It is by a Lady and my Sister […] I must hear from you
a decisive answer as to whether you will risque ye publication
of ye // 1. Hebrew// 2. Sworn Brothers // 3. Shadow
// in one volume’ (NLS, MS 4019, f. 27). This letter gives Chalklen’s
address as Kingstead, near Thrapston, Northants. Chalklen’s
statement that ‘The Hebrew’ is the work of his sister is repeated
in a similar letter of 1 Nov 1827 (f. 29), which refers to ‘The
“Hebrew” a Tale by my Sister—in my handwriting’; but any authorship
other than that by the sender appears to receive sceptical treatment
in the reader’s report sent by David Macbeth Moir to Blackwood
on 3 Oct 1827: ‘I return you Charles Chalklands [sic]
alias Williamson, alias ——s MSS which I have carefully read
over’ (MS 4020, f. 39). No mention of a sister can be found
in two letters from Chalklen’s father, on 8 Jan and 11 Mar 1828,
concerning what appears to be a private financing of ‘The Hebrew’
with Blackwood handling the public launch (MS 4021, ff. 84,
86). Altogether it is not clear whether The Hebrew was
primarily written by Chalker’s sister (whose surname might then
of course have been different), or by Chalklen himself, though
the latter is perhaps more likely. Charles William Chalklen’s
acknowledged works include Babylon, a Poem (1821) and
Semiramis, an Historical Morality, and Other Poems (1847).
ECB dates Mar 1828.
B: New Information Relating
to Authorship, but not Presently Leading to Further Attribution
Changes
1812: 63 [?WATSON, Miss], ROSAMUND,
COUNTESS OF CLARENSTEIN. The question mark qualifying the attribution,
hitherto based on the MS inscription in the Harvard copy, can
now be removed in the light of two letters by Dorothy Wordsworth.
The first, to Jane Marshall of 2 May 1813, reads: ‘I write merely
to request that you will send Miss Watson’s Novel as soon as
you have done with it’ (The Letters of William and Dorothy
Wordsworth: III: The Middle Years, ed. by Ernest De Selincourt,
2nd edn., rev. by Mary Moorman and Alan G. Hill (Oxford: Clarendon
Press, 1979), II, 95). Another letter
of 18 Feb 1815 to Sara Hutchinson, commenting on Anna Maria
Porter’s The Recluse of Norway (1814: 46), states: ‘There
is a good deal of Miss Watson in the colouring of the Ladies
[i.e. Porter sisters]; and when love begins almost all novels
grow tiresome’ (ibid., II, 203). Support
for this definitely being the daughter of Richard Watson, Bishop
of Llandaff, is found in a later letter of 26 Feb 1826, where
Dorothy writes of ‘Watson’s of Calgarth (the Bishop’s Daughter)’,
the Watsons having settled at Calgarth in 1789 (The Letters
of William and Dorothy Wordsworth: V: The Later Years, ed.
by Ernest de Selincourt, 2nd edn., ed. and rev. by Alan G. Hill
(Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1979), I, 95).
1813: 1 ANON, DEMETRIUS, A RUSSIAN ROMANCE.
Some light is thrown on the authorship in a letter of 6 Jan
1813 to Revd William Manley in the Longman Letter Books: ‘We
were duly favored with your letter & the life of Demetrius
which we have perused with pleasure; and if you & the authoress
approve we will undertake the publication of it on the same
plan as we publish the works of Mrs Opie & several other
of our authors—we to print the work at our own risk & divide
the profits of every edition with the author. // We could put
the work to press as soon as we receive your answer. // The
title we consider as rather of two [sic] classical an
appearance for a novel & we would recommend the author to
think of a more popular nature’ (Longman I, 98, no. 4). Taken
at face value, this indicates female authorship, with Manley
acting as a go-between; on the other hand, some room ought perhaps
to be allowed for Manley himself having a more direct hand in
the composition than acknowledged. Evidently, in this case Longmans’
advice over the title led at best only to modification.
1819: 29 [BUSK, Mrs. M. M.], ZEAL AND
EXPERIENCE: A TALE. See 1825: 17 below, for a more positive
identification of the author as Mary Margaret Busk.
1820: 10 ANON, TALES OF MY LANDLORD,
NEW SERIES, CONTAINING PONTEFRACT CASTLE. A letter from Robert
Cadell to Archibald Constable, written at the height of the
furore over this allegedly spurious publication, opens up the
possibility of authorship by Thomas Frognall Dibdin (1776–1847).
Cadell on 30 Oct 1819 writes: ‘You will see
by the Morning Chronicle of this day that John B[allantyne]
has got a reply to his letter, it is causing some laughing—and
the best is to say nothing more on the subject at present—it
is now no quizz—I hear that Thos Dibdin is the author’ (NLS,
MS 323, f. 36v). It is possible that Cadell here is referring
to authorship of the riposte against Scott’s representative
in the paper, and there is also an alternative Dibdin in Thomas
John Dibdin (1771–1841), the actor and playwright. The possibilities
are at best faint, though it is perhaps worth noting that Thomas
Frognall Dibdin was known in the Constable circle, and is also
on record of having at least dabbled with fiction at this period
(his La Belle Marianne: a tale of truth and fiction,
a short piece, was published in 1824).
1821: 17 ANON, TALES OF MY LANDLORD,
NEW SERIES, CONTAINING THE FAIR WITCH OF GLAS LLYN. As the sequel
to the first ‘new series’ (1820: 10), the comments made above
relating to possible authorship by Dibdin might also apply to
this title.
1821: 22 [BENNET, William], THE CAVALIER.
A ROMANCE. NSTC in listing the Philadelphia 1822 edn held at
Harvard notes: ‘sometimes attributed Thomas Roscoe junior’.
Two further ‘Bennet’ titles, The King of the Peak (1823:
23) and Owain Goch (1827: 16), are given in DNB and CBEL3
as by Thomas Roscoe (1791–1871), the son of William Roscoe.
The dedication of The King of the Peak to the Mayor of
Liverpool might also seem to promote the idea of a Roscoe /
Liverpool connection. Furthermore, several of the letters addressed
to William Bennett Esq in the Longman archives appear at points
to indicate that he is the agent rather than actual author.
See, for example, the firm’s letter of 7 Jan 1823: ‘If your
friend can fix on any other good title, it may be as well not
to take that of “King of the Peak”: for, though it may be explained
away in the Preface, at first it will be considered as an adoption
of part of the title of Peverell of the Peak’ (Letter Books,
Longman I, 101, no. 338). On the other hand, there can be no
denying the Derbyshire credentials of this set of novels; and,
in this particular instance, the author responded in his Preface
by asserting that ‘there are many respectable gentlemen in the
county of Derby, who can bear witness that I intended publishing
this work under the title it bears, before there was any annunciation
of Peveril of the Peak’ (vol. 1, p. xvi). Especially telling
in this regard is the family copy described in Wolff (vol. 1,
p. 71; Item 385), with a note laid in saying ‘These books were
written by my great grandfather William Bennet under the pseudonym
Lee Gibbons’. One possible solution for the Longman letters
might be that Bennet’s father, another William, was acting on
behalf of his trainee lawyer son. Alternatively a precocious
younger Bennet could have been successfully juggling the roles
of author and agent himself. Is there evidence of a family of
Derbyshire lawyers in Chapel-en-le-Frith (the place given in
the Dedication of 1821: 22)?
1825: 17 [BUSK, Mrs. M. M.], TALES OF
FAULT AND FEELING. BY THE AUTHOR OF “ZEAL AND EXPERIENCE”. Clear
identification of the author as Mary Margaret Busk (1779–1863)
can be found in Ellen Curran, ‘Holding on by a Pen: the Story
of a Lady Reviewer’, Victorian Periodicals Review 31:1
(Spring 1998), 9–30. Busk, whose literary career followed the
financial difficulties of her father (Alexander Blair) and husband
(William Busk), is described there as a prolific contributor
to the reviews, her many other publications including several
histories, translations and children’s book. It would also appear
that it was this writer’s parents who are being referred to
by Maria Edgeworth in a letter of 4 March 1819: ‘After spending
at the rate of ten thousand a year in high London society he
died almost ruined leaving his widow scarce £400 a year. She
now writes novels if not for bread for butter’ (Letters from
England, 1813–1844, ed. by Christina Colvin (Oxford: Clarendon
Press, 1971), p. 173). No novels by Mrs Blair have so far been
identified, though the date of Edgeworth’s letter perhaps opens
up the possibility of collaboration with her daughter on Zeal
and Experience (see under 1819: 29, above).
1827: 62 [SCARGILL, William Pitt], TRUCKLEBOROUGH
HALL; A NOVEL. An element of doubt was cast in Update 1 on whether
this title, as well Rank and Talent (1829: 72), and Tales
of a Briefless Barrister (1829: 73), conventionally attributed
to Scargill and all upmarket novels published by Henry Colburn,
should be unquestioningly treated as by Scargill. The records
of the Royal Literary Fund indicate that almost certainly his.
A letter from Mrs Scargill to C. P. Roney (4 Jan 1837), concerning
subscriptions to the posthumous The Widow’s Offering,
gives Truckleborough Hall as the first work by the author
to be listed in the title-page (RLF 27: 839, Item 5. Two cuttings
from the Morning Chronicle of 1855 included in the file
(Item 8) also give as among the authors works: Truckleborough
Hall, Rank and Talent, and Tales of a Briefless
Barrister. No mention is made at any point of Truth.
A Novel by the author of Nothing (1826: 68), Elzabeth
Evanshaw, The Sequel of Truth (1827: 61), and Penelope;
or, Love’s Labours Lost (1828: 70), which must remain at
best problematically connected with Scargill.
1828: 1 ANON, DE BEAUVOIR; OR, SECOND
LOVE. A letter from George Croly to William Blackwood, 21 Jan
1828, identifies the author as a female acquaintance: ‘A
lady, the widow of an officer, & a friend of mine, has just
published a Novel, De Beauvoir, or Second Love which
strikes me as clever, & of which she has prodigious
anxiety to have some notice taken in the more prominent publications.
I should wish to oblige her by some short account of
two or three pages of Criticisms in your Magazine. […] The book
is graceful & vigorous, a particular novel without any of
the stupidities & affectations of boudoir & drawing
room knowledge which have brought the name into disrepute’ (NLS,
MS 4021, f. 126).
C: New Titles for Inclusion
1806.
PALMER, Sarah Cornelia.
THE DREAM. BY SARAH CORNELIA PALMER.
London: Printed by E. Thomas, Golden-Lane,
Barbican. For J. M‘Kenzie, No. 20, Old-Bailey, and sold by W,
Harris, High-Street, Shadwell, and the Booksellers in Town and
Country, 1806.
iv, 123p. 8vo. 3s (cover).
C 8000.c.230; NSTC P199 (BI O).
Notes.
Clear fictional narrative within the encompassing frame of a
dream. ‘Contents’ (pp. [iii]–iv) lists main components, but
without giving page numbers. Cambridge copy (not recorded in
NSTC) is in original paper covers, with front cover supplying
fuller details than the t.p. proper. This reads: ‘This day published,
(3s.) The Dream: or Sketches of Some Remarkable Personages in
High Life. […] London: Printed and Published by J. Mackenzie,
Old Bailey; and Sold by Mr. Harris, Bookseller, Shadwell; Mr.
Skelton, Southampton; Mr Matthews, Portsmouth; Mr. Woolmer and
Mr. Rising, Exeter; Mr. Birdsall, Northampton; Mr. Sutton, Nottingham;
and all other Booksellers in Town and Country, 1806.’ End cover
carries a full-page adv. for ‘J. Mackenzie, Bookseller and Publisher’,
informing ‘Friends & Customers, that they may be supplied
with Account Books of all Descriptions, Ruled and Plain; Cyphering
and Copy Books; Memorandum Books; Bibles, Testaments, and Spellings;
Reading Made Easy; Watt’s Divine Songs; Thomson’s Seasons, and
the Death of Abel, very Neat Pocket Editions, Embellished with
Elegant Engravings; Gilt and Plain Paper; Black Lead Pencils,
and Stationery of all Kinds, on the Most Reasonable Terms.’
1827.
[?YU CHIAO LI]; REMUSAT, [Jean
Pierre Abel] (trans.).
IU-KIAO-LI: OR, THE TWO FAIR COUSINS.
A CHINESE NOVEL FROM THE FRENCH VERSION OF M. ABEL-REMUSAT.
IN TWO VOLUMES.
London: Hunt and Clarke, Covent-Garden,
1827.
I xxxv, 259p; II 290p. 12mo. 14s
(ECB).
O 27.261; ECB 303; NSTC 2Y2340
(BI BL, C, E; NA DLC).
Notes.
Trans. of Iu-kiao-li, ou les deux cousines, roman chinois
traduit par M. Abel-Remusat (Paris, 1826). Inscription in
Chinese characters between half-titles and t.p. in each vol.
‘Advertisement’, pp. [vii]–viii; ‘French Translator’s Preface’,
pp. [ix]–xxv. Footnote to the latter states: ‘Some commencing
observations on the nature and tendency of the modern novel
or romance, and on the productions of Sir Walter Scott in particular,
are omitted as possessing little which has not been frequently
repeated by English writers’ (ixn). ‘Note’ (unn.) states that
‘A copy of Iu-Kiao-Li has for nearly two hundred years
formed a part of the very rich collection of Oriental works
in the King’s Library at Paris’, and asserts the authenticity
of the text. Running headlines read: ‘JU-KIAO-LI: OR, THE TWO
COUSINS’. Explanatory footnotes passim in the main text. ‘Supplementary
Notes, supplied by J. H. Pickford, Esq., Member of the Asiatic
Society of Paris’ at end of each vol. No definitive information
about an originating Chinese author has been discovered. ECB
dates May 1827.
Further edn: 1830 as The Two
Fair Cousins; a Chinese Novel (OCLC).
1829.
ANON.
THREE WEEKS IN THE DOWNS, OR CONJUGAL
FIDELITY REWARDED: EXEMPLIFIED IN THE NARRATIVE OF HELEN AND
EDMUND. A TALE FOUNDED ON FACT. BY AN OFFICER’S WIDOW.
London: Published by John Bennett,
Three-Tun Passage, Ivy-Lane, Paternoster-Row; and W. Bennett,
Russell-Street, Plymouth, 1829.
663p. 8vo.
O Vet.A6.e.2132; xNSTC.
Notes:
Additional engraved t.p., also dated 1829, and bearing the imprint
of John Bennett alone. Introductory address (3 pp. unn.) in
which the authoress acknowledges indebtedness ‘to some valuable
Periodicals, as well as to a recent and excellent work
entitled the Night Watch’ (for the latter, see 1828:
11). ‘Contents’ (4 pp. unn.) also precede main narrative, which
itself commences on p. [3]. Engraved frontispiece, plus six
other plates interleaved in text, all save one (undated) bearing
the date 1829. Evidently published first in numbers. Collates
in fours.
Further edn: 1834 (NSTC 2D18353).
D: Titles Previously not
Located for Which Holding Libraries
Have Subsequently Been Discovered
Nothing new to report for this section.
E: New Information Relating to Existing Title
Entries
1815: 21 {DESPORRINS, M.}, THE NEVILLE
FAMILY. The existing entry should be replaced with the following,
as a result of the discovery in the National Library of Ireland
of the original 1814 Cork edn, complete with subscription list.
{DESPOURRINS, M.}.
THE NEVILLE FAMILY; AN INTERESTING TALE, FOUNDED ON FACTS. BY
A LADY. IN THREE VOLUMES.
Cork: Printed for the Author, by W. West & Co. Nelson-Place,
1814.
I xi, iv, 250p; II 220p; III 188p. 12mo. 13s 6d (QR).
QR 13: 531 (July 1815).
D DixCork1814; xNSTC.
Notes: Dedication ‘to the Right Honorable Lady Kinsale’,
signed ‘M. Despourrins’. ‘Subscribers’ Names’ (c. 325
names, mostly from Kinsale and County Cork), vol. 1, pp. [i]–xii.
Collates in sixes. Details from QR almost certainly relate to
the London 1815 edn (see below).
Further edn: London 1815 (Corvey – probably a reissue with cancel
t.p, and lacking the subscription list), CME 3-628-48190-2).
1821: 65 SIDNEY, Philip Francis, THE
RULING PASSION, A COMIC STORY, OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY. Further
information about this title has arisen through a letter addressed
to ‘Allson & Sidney’ in the Longman Letter Books. Dated
30 Dec 1820, this reads: ‘We wish you had sent us a copy of
Ruling Passion. If we are not mistaken it is a translation either
from the French or Italian. We have no objection to publish
the work for you on the usual terms we do such matters—to account
for the books we may sell at the Trade Sale price & charge
a commission of 10 P Cent on the sales, you paying all the expenses
of Advertising, freight, &c. // Have you not been too sanguine
of its sale having printed 2000 copies?’ (Longman I, 101, no.
70). It is likely that Allison & Sidney are ‘the Proprietors
of the Hull Packet [a weekly newspaper]’, for whom the novel
was printed. Mention of the work being a translation also helps
explain the presumably facetious ‘revived, revised, and edited’
incorporated in the fuller title. OCCL (accession no. 8634631)
identifies this work as based on La Fuerza de la sangre
of Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, which itself had been translated
into English as The Prevalence of Blood (London, 1729),
and again, more recently, as The Force of Blood, A Novel
(London, Printed for the translator, by T. Gillet, 1800). No
copy of this work with Longmans included in the imprint has
been discovered, though it is possible that the firm helped
in the remaindering of what is almost certainly correctly perceived
to be an over-large impression.
F: Further Editions Previously
not Noted
1802: 42 MEEKE, [Mary], MIDNIGHT WEDDINGS.
A NOVEL. Blakey lists 2nd edn, 1814 (which is also mentioned
in the French trans. of 1820).
1820: 34 HOGG, James, WINTER EVENING
TALES. Ian Duncan in his Introduction to the recent Stirling
/ South Carolina edn of this work (EUP, 2002) gives the sub-title
of the German trans. of 1822 as; Winter-Abend-Erzählungen.
He also states that it was ascribed to ‘Sir James Hogg’, had
a Preface by Sophie Man, and was published first in Berlin in
1822, then again in Vienna in 1826 (p. xx).
1826: 14 [BANIM, John and Michael],
TALES OF THE O’HARA FAMILY, SECOND SERIES. Republished 1834
as The Nowlans, and Peter of the Castle (OCLC).
1829: 38[GRATTAN, Thomas Colley], TRAITS
OF TRAVEL; OR, TALES OF MEN AND CITIES. New edn 1834, as Tales
of Travel; or Traits of Men and Cities (OCLC).
1829: 59 [MARRYAT, Frederick], THE NAVAL
OFFICER; OR, SCENES AND ADVENTURES IN THE LIFE OF FRANK MILDMAY.
New edn 1835, as Frank Mildmay; or, the Naval Officer
(OCLC).
1829: 68 RITCHIE, Leitch, TALES AND
CONFESSIONS. New edn 1833 , with additions, as London Nights’
Entertainments (COPAC).