Memoir of John Murray
Walter Scott to John Murray, 20 October 1814
Abbotsford, October 20th, 1814.
Dear Sir,
The dissensions of you great potentates of literature in the
case of ‘Marmion’
was the only reason of my not proposing to you to be a sharer in ‘The Lord of the Isles.’ From
personal regard I would willingly have given you (were you to think it as like
to prove advantageous) the share you wish, but you know how disagreeable it is
to be involved in disputes among one’s publishers which you cannot
accommodate. In casting about how I might show you some mark of my sense of
former kindness, a certain ![]()
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MS. History of Scotland in
‘Letters to My Children’ has occurred to me which I consider as a
desideratum; it is upon the plan of ‘Lord Littleton’s Letters,’ as
they are called. A small experimental edition might be hazarded in spring
without a name, not that I am anxious upon the score of secrecy, but because I
have been a great publisher of late. About this I shall be glad to speak with
you, and I am happy to find I shall have an opportunity of seeing you at this
place on Wednesday or Thursday next week, which will give me great pleasure, as
I want to hear about Ellis and Gifford, but especially about Lord Byron.
Yours very faithfully,
George Ellis (1753-1815)
English antiquary and critic, editor of
Specimens of Early English
Poets (1790), friend of Walter Scott.
William Gifford (1756-1826)
Poet, scholar, and editor who began as a shoemaker's apprentice; after Oxford he
published
The Baviad (1794),
The Maeviad
(1795), and
The Satires of Juvenal translated (1802) before becoming
the founding editor of the
Quarterly Review (1809-24).
