The Enlightenment & the book: Scottish authors & their publishers in eighteenth-century Britain, Ireland, & America 9780226752549, 9780226752525, 9780226752532

Table of contents :
Frontmatter
List of Illustrations (page ix)
Abbreviations (page xiii)
Preface (page xv)
Author's Note (page xxiii)
Introduction (page 1)
PART I. SCOTTISH AUTHORS IN A WORLD OF BOOKS
1. Composing the Scottish Enlightenment (page 43)
2. Identity and Diversity among Scottish Authors (page 97)
3. The Rewards of Authorship (page 195)
PART II. PUBLISHING THE SCOTTISH ENLIGHTENMENT IN LONDON AND EDINBURGH
4. Forging the London-Edinburgh Publishing Axis (page 265)
5. The Heyday of Scottish Enlightenment Publishing (page 327)
6. The Achievement of William Creech (page 401)
PART III. REPRINTING THE SCOTTISH ENLIGHTENMENT IN DUBLIN AND PHILADELPHIA
7. The Rise and Fall of Irish Reprinting (page 443)
8. Making Scottish Books in America, 1770-1784 (page 503)
9. "A More Extensive Diffusion of Useful Knowledge": Philadelphia, 1784-1800 (page 541)
Conclusion (page 597)
Bibliography (page 709)
Index (page 757)

Citation preview

The Enlightenment & the Book

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* RICHARD B. SHER xX

The Enlightenment CF the Book Scottish Authors .? “ ° ; ~}-o rr.. _— : :— 7» °*~«J~- :tp=.+ *>>> —w" ie - ow 44% wy ,*eo’7 -‘ ".. "@, a’ *.; oh? * :i

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kigs. 2.8 and Virtually ;¢ —— ‘traits Scotti “nlightenment - rT... : 1]2.9. , all frontispiece portraits In)inScottish I SS . logy of either line engraving or stipple. Fig. 2

igs. 2.8 % 7 | ing or stipple. Fig. 2.8 (top) shows a books used the techno Ogy OT ¢ 5 ‘ rl ‘le fir. 2.9 i raving of Hugh Blair (see fig. 2.16), while fig. 2.5

. , On . ‘tral ober urns

detail from James Caldwall’s « s ‘Robert Burn , ail fr John Beugo'sline 1787engraving stipple portrait of

(bottom) shows aengraving: detail from J g' a| a ey. ing: Special Collections, Specia Fordham University Library; (fig. 2.20). Caldwall oe“ ‘Rm mer W Teatenacaseu ‘Loronto.

Beugoe ngraving:4 Thomas < >"Fisher a: ; Rare Book Library, University of Tor

Identity and Diversity among Scottish Authors + 167

process, was costly in the long run because copperplates wore down quickly with use and then had to be touched up or replaced—unlike durable steel plates, which became technologically feasible in the nineteenth century. More problematic in the short run was the high cost of obtaining both an original portrait and a print made from it. In the late 1760s Allan Ramsay charged twenty guineas (£21) to paint a bust-length portrait (the standard format for use in frontispieces), and in 1777 Sir Joshua Reynolds raised his price for the same service to thirty-five guineas (£36.15s.).'*7 A decade later James Caldwall charged £30 for a frontispiece line engraving of William Leechman. Not only was Caldwall’s price roughly comparable to the cost of sitting for a bust-length portrait by the most famous and expensive portrait painters of the age but it also represented almost 40 percent of the cost of printing 1,250 copies of the two-volume book in which the frontispiece appeared (no. 283), including the type, many days of labor by compositors and pressmen, extra charges for corrections, and _all other production expenses except paper (SA 48815, fol. 126, where the total printing charge 1s reported as £76.8s.). The high price of engraving was dictated by supply and demand, since line and stipple engravers who were willing and able to make accurate portrait prints were always in short supply. For the same reason, the most sought-after engravers worked at their own pace, and publication of books with frontispiece portraits was sometimes delayed for months while they finished their work. Frontispiece portraits of authors were therefore relatively uncommon during the age of the Scottish Enlightenment. When they occurred in books by living authors, they were usually not in the first volume of the first edition but rather were added after a book had achieved some critical and commercial success, presumably because this made it easier to justify the addition of an authorial portrait as a response to public interest. As far as I have been able to ascertain, the earliest instance among the books listed in table 2 occurred in 1763, when the first volume of a “new” (i.e., second) edition of Tobias Smollett’s Contznuation of the Complete

History of England (no. 67) contained a frontispiece head-and-shoulders portrait of the author engraved by Francois Aliamet after a painting by Sir Joshua Reynolds. A few years later David Hume received the same honor. It was not Hume himself, but his publisher, Andrew Millar, who had insisted on a frontispiece portrait. “I am much, much better pleasd to have the Edition come out without it,” Hume told Millar in October 1766; 147. Smart, dilan Ramsay, Painter, App. B; Weindorf, Szr Joshua Reynolds, 96. Of course, half-length and full-length portraits by these painters cost much more.

168 * CHAPTER TWO

“I am indeed averse to the prefixing a Print of the Author, as savouring of Vanity” (LDH, 2:97—98). Vanity or not, Hume had reluctantly agreed that his friend Allan Ramsay, who had just painted his portrait for the second time, dressed in a magnificent scarlet and gold coat, would select a suitable engraver, but Ramsay told him that none could be found in Scotland “that is capable of doing a head tolerably” (LDH, 2:97).'*° When

the matter surfaced again a year later, Millar wanted Hume to sit for James Ferguson, who had made his living painting miniature portraits before achieving success as a science lecturer and author. Hume, however,

recommended an existing portrait drawn by John Donaldson, “in every body’s Opinion, as well as my own... the likest that has been done for me, as well as the best Likeness” (LDH, 2:169). Two engravings were accordingly made from the Donaldson drawing at this time. The 1767 octavo reissue of the History of England used one by the Irishman Patrick Halpen or Halpin, showing Hume turned to his left. The 1768 quarto edition of Essays and Treatises used a different engraving by Simon Francois Ravenet, showing Hume turned to his right (fig. 1.1). As we saw in the last chapter, this was an important edition of Essays and Treatises, which marked a critical moment in the repackaging of Hume as an eminent philosophical author. The addition of a newly commissioned frontispiece portrait was a significant component in that process. Looking portly and distinguished in a white powdered wig, Hume is set within

an oval frame, which rests against a masonry wall on whose ledge the words “DAVID HUME ESQ” have been inscribed. Between those words and

the portrait itself are two partially concealed quill pens and two bound volumes. One of the volumes lies open, with the words “History and” displayed on one page and “Philosophy” on the other. This arrangement not only conveys a sense of intellectual permanence but also presents the author as a versatile man of letters who was the master of two distinct scholarly genres. Although subsequent editions of Essays and Treatises did not contain

Hume’s likeness, a frontispiece portrait after the Donaldson drawing graced most late eighteenth-century editions of Hume's History of England. From 1782 onward, such frontispiece portraits, together with Hume’s autobiographical sketch “My Own Life” and the laudatory letter that Adam Smith had written shortly after Hume’s death, created a powerful paratextual effect. Readers encountered Hume as a unique individual, and the tex148. However, in 1767 a mezzotint was made from Ramsay’s portrait by David Martin. See Smart, Allan Ramsay: Complete Catalogue, 139.

Identity and Diversity among Scottish Authors + 169

tual description and self-description of the author were reinforced by visual imagery. As sales increased, the principal publisher of Hume's History of England, Millar’s successor ‘Thomas Cadell, sought a way to extend the coverage beyond Hume's ending point in 1688. After several false starts, | he obtained his goal in 1785 by joining forces with Richard Baldwin to publish a History of England by Tobias Smollett that could be marketed, through a slight of hand, as a “continuation” of Hume.’*? Smollett’s Hzstory was deliberately printed in the same typeface and format as Hume’s History, “so that any gentleman, possessed of the latter, may take up his History at the Revolution, where Hume breaks off, and find a regular connexion in this complete History given by Smollet.”’’° In 1788, presumably to commemorate the centenary of the Glorious Revolution, the well-worn John Donaldson drawing of Hume was reengraved by Joseph Collyer the younger in a more elaborate setting that shows an armed Britannia looking on with approval as a muse inscribes Hume’s name beneath his portrait (fig. 2.10). This plate was used for the frontispiece in the first volume of anew octavo edition of Hume’s History, bearing the imprint 1789, which also included prints of historical figures and events. In the following year

a new octavo edition of Smollett’s History appeared with similar illustrations, including a new frontispiece portrait of the author engraved by Collyer to match the one of Hume (fig. 2.11). Collyer closely copied the oval portrait by Aliamet that had originally appeared in the 1763 “new” edition of Smollett’s original Continuation of his own Complete History of England, but he set the portrait above a mythological scene that featured

Clio, the muse of history, with a quarto volume in one hand and a quill pen in the other. This double-barreled History of England was extremely popular, particularly in the form of a thirteen-volume, illustrated octavo set (eight volumes by Hume, five volumes by Smollett), and it is significant

that most contemporary reprints by competitors in London, Scotland, and even America found it advisable to include frontispiece portraits of the authors as well as plates of historical figures and events. 149. Smollett had actually been a friendly competitor of Hume. His Continuation of the Complete History of England, originally published by Baldwin between 1760 and 1765, was meant to continue to 1765 not Hume’s work but his own Complete History of England (no. 49), which stopped in 1748. Cadell and Baldwin combined the last part of the Complete History (covering the period 1688—1748) with the first four volumes of the Continuation (covering the period 1748—60), added some revisions and a new title, and marketed the work under Smollett’s name. See, for some aspects of this story, Knapp, “Publication,” 295-308. 150. Advertisement prefixed to the first volume of Smollett, History of England.

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pe... 472g & Fig. 5.3. The Strahan printing ledgers are a goldmine of information about eighteenth-century book production. This image shows the books that Strahan charged to Cadell’s account from November 1777 through April 1778, including various editions of Scottish Enlightenment books that were copublished by Strahan and Cadell. British Library, Add. MSS 48816, fol. 21v.

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just five months, Strahan printed for the publishing partnership 500 copies of the second edition of Adam Smith’s Wealth of Nations (no. 177), 750 copies of the second edition of Henry Mackenzie’s Julia de Roubigné (no. 183), 1,000 copies of the first edition of James Ferguson’s Select Mechanical Exercises (no. 153), 1,000 copies of the sixth edition of Mackenzies Man of Feeling (no. 135), 500 copies of the second edition of Robert Watson's History of Philtp II (no. 186), 1,000 copies of the second edition of James Ferguson's Art of Drawing in Perspective (no. 168), 1,500 copies of an eight-volume octavo edition of David Hume’s History of England (no. 75), and 1,500 copies of the second edition of William Robertson’s History of America (no. 185). We can see that Strahan was also printing other books

for the partnership during this period, from a cheap reprint of Alexander Pope’s Essay on Man (1777) to a two-volume quarto edition of Louis Chambaud’s French-English dictionary (1778; copublished by Peter Elmsley).

But literary and learned works by Scottish authors constituted the core of their publishing program. At the end of each year, Strahan would total the printing bill and the account would be settled. The amounts were not trivial: £1,682.3s. in 1777, and £1,472.15s.6d. in just the first third of 1778. However, the published books were bringing in revenues that far exceeded these printing costs, and large profits were generated. Besides the basic agreement between Strahan and Cadell themselves, the publishing partnership was sustained through the cultivation of closer ties with the book trade in Edinburgh. In this respect, Cadell seems to have thrown his net somewhat wider than Strahan, particularly in his greater willingness to collaborate with one of the rising stars of Edinburgh publishing, Charles Elliot. But the key to the London—Edinburgh axis lay with Strahan’s old friends in the Scottish capital. We have already

seen that on his periodic excursions to Scotland Strahan spent much of his time in the company of Alexander Kincaid and John Balfour, near contemporaries who operated the leading Scottish bookselling and publishing firms for much of the third quarter of the eighteenth century. On 26 June 1768 Strahan made his most important summer jaunt to Scotland. Millar had died less than three weeks earlier, leaving behind both uncertainty and opportunity regarding the publication of new works by Scottish authors. In Scotland Strahan met frequently with both Kincaid

| and Balfour. A typical entry was the one Strahan made in his journal on 1 August: “Dined at home. Called on Mr Kincaid, Dr. Robertson, Marchioness of Lothian, etc. Supt at Mr Balfour.” Strahan was then preparing to copublish William Robertson’s History of Charles V with Balfour, and we know that some of his meetings with

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both Balfour and Robertson were meant to finalize the details of that ambitious project. It is also likely that on this visit Strahan met Balfour’s son John, who would serve an apprenticeship with him in London from 1771 to 1778 and then return to Scotland to manage Balfour's paper mill near Edinburgh. As we have seen, Strahan and Balfour had been friends since their childhood days in Edinburgh. Just as Strahan visited Balfour on his periodic jaunts to Edinburgh, Balfour sometimes traveled to London for the express purpose of seeing his friend.** The two men held similar, conservative views on British foreign policy and American affairs.** Balfour’s deference to his old friend was such that he confided in Strahan about the prospect of building a gunpowder mill in Scotland in 1780, adding that Strahan’s advice on the matter would “go a great way” toward determin-

ing his decision.”’ Still another link between them was the Edinburgh printer-scholar William Smellie, who was Balfour’s partner during the 1760s and a great favorite of Strahan’s. For all these reasons, the association with Balfour would form one of the Edinburgh pillars supporting the

Strahan—Cadell publishing edifice. | The other pillar of the Edinburgh connection was the bookselling firm headed by Alexander Kincaid, whose long friendship with Strahan was noted in the last chapter. More significant than any particular copublication project they may have discussed during the summer of 1768 was the attempt by Strahan to map out a comprehensive strategy for publishing

new work by Scottish authors. In a letter of 19 September, two weeks after his return to London, Strahan explained to Creech (who had been out of town when Strahan visited during the summer) that he had made a “very bold Push” to influence Kincaid in regard to Creech’s career. The arguments he had made in person were subsequently reinforced in a let-

ter to Kincaid that he quoted to Creech, including this revealing passage: “[ wanted to concert such measures with you (at this Juncture on Mr Millar’s Demise) that you, Mr Cadell and I might secure any Author's of our Country, whether resident here or with you, that were worth notice; which I am certain might very easily be done.” There follows a passage— 23. Strahan to Hall, 24 Aug. 1770, in “Correspondence between William Strahan and David Hall,” 11:352. 24. For example, Balfour’s support for the war against the American “rebels” 1s evident in his letters to James Ross of 21 May 1777 and 10 March 1778, in the Gordon Castle Muniments, National Archives of Scotland, GD44/43/173. For Strahan’s views on this subject, see Cochrane, Dr. Johnson’s Printer, chap. 13. 25. Balfour to Strahan, 10 July 1780, Pierpont Morgan Library, Misc. English.

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quoted at greater length in chapter 6, where Creech’s career is considered more fully—in which Strahan tries to convince Kincaid “to hasten your Separation from Mr Bell” and replace him with Creech. Thus, Strahan made it clear to Kincaid that his exertions on behalf of Creech were driven by his wish to establish a reliable London—Edinburgh syndicate that would corner the market on publishing what we now call the Scottish Enlightenment in the post-Millar era. He knew that Kincaid was no longer an aggressive force in publishing and that his junior part-

ner John Bell did not get along well with Cadell. He therefore wanted Kincaid to select a younger partner who would be Strahan and Cadell’s principal associate in Edinburgh. Strahan was well aware that meddling in the business affairs of his old friend, and corresponding with Creech behind Kincaid’s back, was hardly behavior of which to be proud, but he was hopeful that Kincaid would not take offense. “I securely trust in my long and intimate Friendship with him,” Strahan confided to Creech in his letter of 19 September, “that he will not be angry at my Interfering in a matter which a Person not so good naturedly-disposed as he is, might

be apt to be.” As Strahan continued to pressure Kincaid on this matter over the next three years, he relied on Creech for inside information about what was happening in the world of Edinburgh publishing. “Let me have any news that may be stirring with you,” he wrote on 22 December 1768, “especially among the trade.” Once Creech was finally installed as Kincaid’s partner and successor

in 1771, Strahan laid out his publishing strategy. “I shall be very well pleased to be concerned in any thing along with you and Mr Cadell,” he tells Creech on 4 January 1772: “I mean any thing of Consequence, for small Shares of small Books are hardly worth the Trouble of keeping an Account of them, especially as I have a great many different Acc[oun]ts to adjust and keep already. But in a Work of any Bulk or Consideration I have no Objection to being joined with you and Mr Cadell, as we understand one another perfectly well.” The first two Scottish manuscripts that fell under this instruction were the first volume of Lord Monboddo’s Of the Origin and Progress of Language (no. 160) and Lord Kames’s Sketches of the History of Man (no. 164), both of which were sent to Strahan for evaluation late in 1773. On 13 November Strahan regretfully declined to

, copublish Monboddo’s manuscript on the grounds that “it will not be a popular Book” (Cadell would, however, play a role in its publication), but in a letter of 17 January 1774 he praised Kames’s work (“every Page I have yet dipp'd into contains some what [1.e., thing] amusing or instructive,

or both”) and declared that “Mr Cadell and 1... thankfully accept your

The Heyday of Scottish Enlightenment Publishing + 339

Offer, and will do what in us lies to usher it into the Public, with every Advantage we can give it, and push the Sale here to the utmost.” As Monboddo’s work demonstrates, Strahan did not mean it literally when he told Creech that he and Cadell would be happy to collaborate on any substantial new book. Unlike Millar, Strahan seems to have personally read, or at least “dipp’d into,” all manuscript submissions, and he had great confidence in his own judgment. His correspondence with Creech is filled with rejections of manuscripts offered for copublication, some of which were subsequently published or copublished by other booksellers, such as John Murray, Charles Elliot, and Creech himself. Nor did Strahan abide in every instance by his policy of declining to collaborate on “small Books.” Not long after Strahan, Cadell, and Creech began to copublish Scottish authors, Strahan told Creech in a letter of 17 January 1774 that young James Gregory had offered him a little manuscript by his father, the late Dr. John Gregory of the University of Edinburgh, “only 50 Pages in Writing,” which the three men would copublish that spring under the title 4 Father's Legacy to His Daughters (no. 163). The low retail price of this little book (just two shillings) must have held down the profits on each edition, but it was immediately hugely successful as a guide to female social behavior and moral values and therefore profitable for its publishers, In spite of competition from many unauthorized editions. Although Strahan, Cadell, and Creech published the early editions of 4 Father’s Legacy on a conditional basis, Strahan subsequently pushed Creech to secure the copyright and was delighted when he did so on favorable terms late in the summer.”°

The most impressive collaborative accomplishments of Strahan, Cadell, and Creech were the large number of major books by Scottish authors that they copublished during the 1770s and early 1780s. Besides the second volume of Sir John Dalrymple’s Memozrs of Great Britain and Ireland (1773; no. 143), which was the last major new title to include Kin-

caid’s name in its imprint along with Creech’s, the trio copublished in succession Alexander Gerard’s Essay on Gentus (no. 162)—along with Gregory's Father's Legacy and Kames’s Sketches of the History of Man—in 1774; George Campbell’s Philosophy of Rhetoric (no. 174) in 1776, Robert Watson's History of Philip II (no. 186), Henry Mackenzie’s Julia de Roubigné (no. 183), and the first volume of Hugh Blair’s Sermons (no. 188) in 1777; most of Smellie’s multivolume translation of Buffon’s Natural History (no. 212) in 1780; the book version of The Mirror (no. 217) in 1781; and 26. Moran, “From Rudeness to Refinement,” 122-26; and chap. 3 in this volume.

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Adam Ferguson’s Progress and Termination of the Roman Republic (no. 232), Hugh Blair’s Lectures on Rhetoric and Belles Lettres (no. 230), and James Beattie’s Dissertations, Moral and Critical (no. 229) in 1783. In reality, the

extent of their collaboration was even greater, because all their names did not always appear in the imprints of works they copublished. For example, in 1776 Adam Smith’s Wealth of Nations (no. 177) was advertised in the Edinburgh newspapers by Creech as if he were its publisher, even though the imprint contains only the names of Strahan and Cadell; other evidence seems to corroborate Creech’s involvement.*’ Other books by Scottish authors were published by Strahan and Cadell alone, by Creech and Cadell without Strahan, or, in the case of William Robertson’s histories, by Strahan and Cadell along with Balfour. Taken as a whole, the London—Edinburgh publishing syndicate led by Strahan and Cadell stood at the head of the profession. Holding the syndicate together was not always easy. As we shall see in chapter 6, Strahan lectured and disciplined Creech whenever he believed the younger man was not behaving properly. He never relaxed his control, and even his good wishes were peppered with instructional proverbs, as in the closing to his letter of 10 November 1773: “I hope all goes well with you, and that you grow in favour with all Mankind. Punctuality, Regularity, and Precision are the very Life of Business. And none of these, I hope will be wanting with you.” Early in the relationship, Creech complained to Strahan about Cadell’s lack of punctuality in his correspondence, to which Strahan replied on 18 March 1774 that “this must be purely accidental” because Cadell “possesses, in truth, the true Spirit of Business, as you will every Day be more and more convinced of.” It would not be surprising if Strahan then lectured Cadell (who was, it must be remembered, only two and a half years older than Creech) on the importance of punctuality in Azs correspondence, for the problem does not seem to have arisen again. The final component in Strahan’s imperial vision proved more difficult

to attain. Strahan wished to see his two Edinburgh copublishers, John Balfour and (after Kincaid’s retirement) William Creech, collaborating with each other—and ultimately with Strahan and Cadell—in what he called, in a letter to Creech of 21-22 February 1774, a “Coalition between

you in regard to the Purchase of Copies.” The plan started on a high note in 1772, when Strahan, Cadell, Balfour, and Kincaid & Creech joined forces to copublish the revised second edition of William Buchan’s Domestic Medicine, originally printed for the author in 1769 by Balfour’s firm

, 27. Sher, “New Light,” 26n2.

oF

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_ Domeftic Medicine:

_—CséBuchan originally ———“‘“‘“‘“‘i‘