Richard F. Burton

And now I must proceed a trifle further a-field and meet

The Critic in Anglo-America.

The Boston Daily Advertiser (Jan. 26,’86) contains the following choice morceau which went the round of the Transatlantic Press:—­

G. W. S. writes from London to the New York Tribune in regard to Captain Burton’s notorious translation of the “Arabian Nights.”  Of Captain Burton’s translation of “The Arabian Nights,” two volumes have now appeared.  Before anything had been seen of them, I gave some account of this scheme, and of the material on which he had worked, with a statement of the reasons which made all existing versions unsatisfactory to the student, and incomplete.  Captain Burton saw fit to reprint these desultory paragraphs as a kind of circular or advertisement on his forthcoming book.  He did not think it necessary to ask leave to do this, nor did I know to what use my letter had been put till it was too late to object.  In any ordinary case it would have been of no consequence, but Captain Burton’s version is of such a character that I wish to state the facts, and to say that when I wrote my letter I had never seen a line of his translation, and had no idea that what I said of his plans would be used for the purpose it has been, or for any purpose except to be printed in your columns.  As it is, I am made to seem to give some sort of approval to a book which I think offensive, and not only offensive, but grossly and needlessly offensive.  If anybody has been induced to subscribe for it by what I wrote I regret it, and both to him and to myself I think this explanation due.

Mr. Smalley is the London correspondent of the New York Tribune, which represents Jupiter Tonans in the Western World.  He may be unable to write with independent tone—­few Anglo-Americans can afford to confront the crass and compound ignorance of a “free and independent majority”—­but even he is not called upon solemnly to state an untruth.  Before using Mr. Smalley’s article as a circular, my representative made a point of applying to him for permission, as he indeed was bound to do by the simplest rules of courtesy.  Mr. Smalley replied at once, willingly granting the favour, as I can prove by the note still in my possession; and presently, frightened by the puny yelping of a few critical curs at home, he has the effrontery to deny the fact.

In my last volumes I have been materially aided by two Anglo-American friends, mm Thayer and Cotheal, and I have often had cause to thank the Tribune and the Herald of New York for generously appreciating my labours.  But no gratitude from me is due to the small fry of the Transatlantic Press which has welcomed me with spiteful little pars mostly borrowed from unfriends in England and mainly touching upon style and dollars.  In the Mail Express of New York (September 7, ’85) I read, “Captain Richard Burton, traveller and translator, intends