The Correspondence of Thomas Carlyle and Ralph Waldo Emerson, 1834-1872, Vol. I eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 316 pages of information about The Correspondence of Thomas Carlyle and Ralph Waldo Emerson, 1834-1872, Vol. I.

The Correspondence of Thomas Carlyle and Ralph Waldo Emerson, 1834-1872, Vol. I eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 316 pages of information about The Correspondence of Thomas Carlyle and Ralph Waldo Emerson, 1834-1872, Vol. I.

Your affectionate
               Jane Carlyle

XXX.  Carlyle to Emerson

Chelsea, London, 15 November, 1835

Dear Emerson,—­Hardly above a week ago, I wrote you in immediate answer to some friendly inquiries produced by negligence of mine:  the Letter is probably tumbling on the salt waves at this hour, in the belly of the “Great Western”; or perhaps it may be still on firm land waiting, in which case this will go along with it.  I had written before out of Scotland a Letter of mere acknowledgment and postponement; you must have received that before now, I imagine.  Our small piece of business is now become articulate, and I will despatch it in a paragraph.  Pity my stupidity that I did not put the thing on this footing long ago!  It never struck me till the other day that though no copy of our Miscellanies would turn up for inspection here, and no Bookseller would bargain for a thing unseen, I myself might bargain, and leave their hesitations resting on their own basis.  In fine, I have rejected all their schemes of printing Miscellaneous Works here, printing Sketches of German Literature, or printing anything whatever on the “half-profits system,” which is like toilsomely scattering seed into the sea:  and I settled yesterday with Fraser to give him the American sheets, and let them sell themselves, on clear principles, or remain unsold if they like.  I find it infinitely the best plan, and to all appearance the profitablest as to money that could have been devised for me.

What you have to do therefore is to get Two Hundred and Fifty copies (in sheets) of the whole Four Volumes, so soon as the second two are printed, and have them, with the proper title-page, sent off hither to Fraser’s address; the sooner the better.  The American title-page, instead of “Boston,” &c. at the bottom, will require to bear, in three lines “London:  / James Fraser, 215 Regent Street, / 1839.”  Fraser is anxious that you should not spell him with a z; your man can look on the Magazine and beware.  I suppose also you should print labels for the backs of the four volumes, to be used by the half-binder; they do the books in that way here now:  but if it occasion any difficulty, never mind this; it was not spoken of to Fraser, and is my own conjecture merely; the thing can be managed in various other ways.  Two Hundred and Fifty copies, then, of the entire book:  there is nothing else to be attended to that you do not understand as well as I. Fraser will announce it in his Magazine:  the eager, select public will wait.  Probably, there is no chance before the middle of March or so?  Do not hurry yourselves, or at all change your rate for us: but so soon as the work is ready in the course of Nature, the earliest conveyance to the Port of London will bring a little cargo which one will welcome with a strange feeling!  I declare

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The Correspondence of Thomas Carlyle and Ralph Waldo Emerson, 1834-1872, Vol. I from Project Gutenberg. Public domain.