are going on with the series; and that you do
not dwell more than is necessary upon the _Poetae Minores_, whom no one
cares about. This is what has sometimes been objected to your articles;
and among other remonstrances I have received, I extract the following
from the letter of a gentleman for whom I have a great respect. He says
your article contains 'misstatements, and some of them of a mischievous
tendency; but what mostly concerns you to know is the odium which is
likely to be thrown on your Magazine, in America at least, by the manner
in which (from malice or blundering) some meritorious individuals are
dealt with, _who have every claim to the shelter of private life_.'"

As the meddling gentleman from whose letter the passage was taken did
not particularize, all I could do in reply, and that I lost no time in
doing, was to give him the lie direct, and offer my name to the
publisher. I called for specifications and proof, which never came; and
have an idea that the writer was an artist--a great coxcomb--of whom I
had spoken too well, on paper, though not well enough to satisfy his
inordinate vanity.

"I make no apology to you," continues "Old Christopher," "for giving you
this extract from my friend's letter. He is, I trust, writing under some
strong feeling of something or other, which has concerned some one whom
he knows; but I am sure he is perfectly sincere in what he says. I hope,
therefore, you will be particularly on your guard against saying
anything which any one would be entitled on good grounds to say was
unfair or ungentlemanly. I regret that, in the hurry of the sheet going
to press, what is said of Hall (John E. Hall of Philadelphia) was not
modified. '_Blackguard_' is a shocking appellation; and had my friend
seen this number, I should not have wondered at his remarks. You will,
I am sure, excuse me," etc., etc.

"All very just and proper," said I to myself; but coming from a man who
not long before had said in "Maga," or allowed somebody to say for him,
with a chuckle of triumph never to be forgotten, that Canning had given
the lie to Brougham on the floor of Parliament, I must acknowledge that
I felt rather astonished at his sensitiveness.

On the 19th of February, 1825,--by which time I had completed the series
of "American Writers," pursuing my first plan without deviating from it
a hair's breadth, and introducing an American department into three or
four monthlies,--never, in fact, writing a