Z1118/1/23/2

Letter from Bernard Barton at Woodbridge [Suffolk] to George Procter at 101 Fleet Street, London Thy reply to my proposition is precisely what I should have expected from a sensible goodnatured Man; and I have no doubt thy Senior Partner will pronounce an opinion not much dissimilar though I candidly confess to thee had I been premonished of your being, just now near a hundred miles apart, and that my out of the way suggestion was likely to be discussed by adjournments, I should never have had resolution to have made it. Such jeu d'esprits are very apt to grow cool with time, but in the present case it will only lead me, I think, to alter my mode, and instead of singing the praises of Papier Mache Boxes, may induce me to take up an "Essay on Snuff-taking". If I do this it will be either in the New Monthly Magazine published by Colburn & Co. or the London which comes out from your Neighbours Taylor & Nessay but of course it is too late this month to think about it. But be the future as it may, the Volume, now in thy possession is of no very particular value to me, and therefore there is no need for thee to wait for the final result of our bargain to use it as unceremoniously as possible; I am now reprinting a third edition of my first arrived volume, in which some of those contain'd in the amateur's Vol are included, but along with them are more than an equal quantity of new ones: when said 3rd edition comes out, which as it is more than half printed, I take it will soon be the case, if a copy of it would be the smallest gratification to either thy Partner or thyself I will order one to be left at 101 Fleet Street. I am too thorough a Snuff-taker to want to make any profitable speculation of praise bestowed on Snuff, that praise shall one day or other, in prose or verse, be bestowed con amore, whether your Box makes its appearance or not; and either thy Partner or thyself are equally welcome on either contingency, to the Book now at Fleet Street or the forthcoming one. Knowing nothing how a whimsical proposition might be rec'd from an entire stranger I thought it as well to make it in the way of a proposed venture[?], with business-like gravity, but I had much rather any such interchange of the wares in which we respectively deal should take place on the more social footing of personal goodwill, than on any other scene

26 Jul 1822

From: 1822 To: 1822

item

Barton, Bernard,
Procter, George,
Colburn & Company,
Taylor & Nessay

poems, Colburn & Company, magazines, snuff taking, Taylor & Nessay