Now if you are not tired of all this criticism, it is not my

fault.

Your's, very affectionately,

C. J. FOX.

St. Anne's Hill, Wednesday..

P. S. Even in the 1st book, Eneas says, fama super athera notus." Can you bear this?

"Sum pius Eneas,

LIST OF AMERICAN NEWSPAPERS

The following list of American newspapers, is taken from Mellish's Travels, where it appears as an extract from Thomas's History of printing in America.

Isaiah Thomas, Esq. of Worcester, Massachusetts, has lately published a very valuable work entitled, The History of Printing in America, from which I have extracted the following table:

By this table, it appears that the number of newspapers amounts to twen ty-two million two hundred twenty-two thousand two hundred; and Mr. Thomas says it may be viewed as considerably under the real number. The total amount, he thinks, may, without exaggeration, be estimated at twentytwo million five hundred thousand. In Britain and Ireland the newspaper es tablishments amount to two hundred twenty-eight; and the whole of the pub lic journals issued annually from the various presses are computed at twenty million five hundred thousand.

The state of literature in a country may be partly inferred from the quantity of paper manufactured. Mr. Thomas says, "from the information I have collected, it appears that the mills for manufacturing paper are as follows:→→

From Dr. Mitchell's report, the numbers appear to be 190.

The paper manufactured annually at these mills is estimated as follows:

ONE might imagine that the fate of authors was really pitiable. Dr. Tissot has written a learned and melancholy volume on the diseases incident to men of letters, and D'Israeli has lately completed the picture by two volumes on the moral calamities of authors. In describing the misfortunes of his brethren, the man of letters has, however, the advantage over the physician. D'Israeli, we believe, enjoys a happy mediocrity of fortune, and being himself exempt from most of the calamities which he enumerates, he has enlivened his descriptions by a variety of a literary anecdotes, and minute details of character, many of which are quite original. Without attempting any analysis of its contents, we shall extract some interesting passages.

On the subject of "literary property," we have the following curious facts:

Authors continué poor, and booksellers become opulent; an extraordinary result! Booksellers are not agents for authors, but proprietors of their works; so that the perpetual revenues of literature are solely in the possession of the trade.

Is it then wonderful that even successful authors are indigent? They are heirs to fortunes, but by a strange singularity they are disinherited at their birth; for, on the publication of their works, these cease to be their own property. Let that natural property be secured, and a good book would be an inheritance, a leasehold or a freehold, as you choose it; it might at least last out a generation, and descend to the author's blood, were they permitted to live on their father's glory, as in all other property they do on his industry." Something of this nature has been instituted in France, where the descendants of Corneille and Moliere retain a claim on the theatres whenever the dramas of their great ancestor are performed. In that country literature has ever received peculiar honours-it was there decreed, in the affair of Crebillon, that literary productions are not seizable by creditors.

The history of Literary Property in this country might form as ludicrous a narrative as Lucian's "true history." It was a long while doubtful whether any such thing existed, at the very time when booksellers were assigning over the perpetual copy-rights of books, and making them the subject of family settlements for the provision of their wives and children!

When Tonson in 1739 obtained an injunction to restrain another bookseller from printing Milton's Paradise Lost, he brought into court as a proof of his title an assignment of the orignal copy-right, made over by the sublime poet in 1667, which was read. Milton received for this assignment the sum which

*The following facts will show the value of Literary Property; immense profits and cheap purchases! The manuscript of Robinson Crusoe ran through the whole trade, and no one would print it; the bookseller, who, it is said, was not remarkable for his discernment, but for a speculative turn, bought the work, and got a thousand guineas by it. How many have the booksellers since accumulated? Burn's Justice was disposed of by its author for a trifle, as well as Buchan's Domestic Medicine; these works yield annual incomes. Goldsmith's Vicar of Wakefield was sold in the hour of distress, with httle distinction from any other work in that class of composition; and Evelina produced five guineas from the niggardly trader. Dr. Johnson fixed the price of his Biography of the Poets at two hundred guineas; and Mr. Malone observes, the booksellers in the course of twentyfive years have probably got five thousand. I could add a great number of facts of this nature which relate to living writers; the profits of their own works for two or three years would rescue them from the horrors and humiliation of pauperism. It is, perhaps, useful to record, that, while the compositions of genius are but slightly remunerated, though sometimes as productive as "the household stuff" of literature, the latter is rewarded with princely magnificence. At the sale of the Robinsons, the copy-right of "Vyse's Spelling-book" was sold at the enormous price of 22007. with an annuity of fifty guineas for the author! A Spaniard, kissing the hands of Mr. Vyse, would wish him a thousand years for this annuity! But can we avoid recollecting, that many a fine genius is darning his own stockings.

we all know-Tonson and all his family and assignees rode in their carriages with the profits of the five pound epic.*

Among the unfortunate persons whose historics are given in the list of despairing poets, is one whose lot was singulariy miserable.

Henry Carey was one of our most popular poets: he, indeed, has unluckily met with only dictionary critics, or what is as fatal to genius, the cold undistinguishing commendation of grave men on subjects of humour, wit, and the lighter poetry. The works of Carey do not appear in any of our great collections, where Walsh, Duke, and Yaldon slumber on their thrones.

Yet Carey was a true son of the Muses, and the most successful writer in our language. He is the author of several little national poems. In early life he successfully burlesqued the affected versification of Ambrose Philips, in his baby poems; to which he gave the fortunate appellation of " Namby Pamby, a panegyric on the new versification," a term descriptive in sound of these chiming folies, and now adopted in the style of criticism. Carey's "Namby Pamby" was at first considered by Swift as the satirical effusion of Pope, and by Pope as the humorous ridicule of Swift. His ballad of " Sally in our Alley" was more than once commended for its nature by Addison, and is sung to this day. Of the national song " God save the King,” he was the author both of the words and the music. He was very successful on the stage, and wrote admirable burlesques of the Italian opera, in " The Dragon of Wantley," and "The Dragoness;" and the mock tragedy of" Chrononho- . tonthologos," is not forgotten. Among his poems, lie still concealed several original pieces; those which have a political turn, are particularly good, for the politics of Carey were those of a poet and a patriot. I refer the polician who has any taste for poetry and humour, to "The Grumbletonians, or the Dogs without doors, a Fable," very instructive to those grown-up folks, "The Ins and the Outs." "Carey's Wish" is in this class; and, as the purity of

He

* The elder Tonson's portrait represents him in his gown and cap, holding in his right hand a volume lettered "Paradise Lost”—such a favourite object was Milton and copy-right! Jacob Tonson was the founder of a race who long honoured literature. His rise in life is curious. He was at first unable to pay twenty pounds for a play by Dryden, and joined with another bookseller to advance that sum; the pl y sold, and Tonson was afterwards enabled to purchase the succeeding ones. He and his nephew died worth two hundred thousand pounds. Much old Tonson owed to his own industry; but he was a mere trader. and Dryden had frequent bickerings; he insisted on receiving 10,000 verses for two hundred and sixty-eight pounds, and poor Dryden threw in the finest ode in the langu ge towards the number. He would pay in the base coin which was then current; which was a loss to the poet. Tonson once complained to Dryden, that he had received 1446 lines of his translation of Ovid for his Miscellany for fifty guineas, when he had calculated at the rate of 1518 lines for forty guineas; and he gives the poet a piece of critical reasoning, for Tonson considered he had a better bargain with "Juvenal, which is reckoned not so easy to translate as Ovid." In these times such a mere trader in literature has disappeared.