ay about this, which he
calls "a whisky-frisky article," on June 30. "I take the advantage of
forwarding Sir John's _Review_, to send you back his letters under the
same cover. He is an incomparable goose, but as he is innocent and
good-natured, I would not like it to be publicly known that the
flagellation comes from my hand. Secrecy therefore will oblige me."]

_Mr. Sharon Turner to John Murray_.

"I cannot endure the idea of an individual being wounded merely because
he has written a book. If, as in the case of the authors attacked in the
'Baviad,' the works censured were vitiating our literature--or, as in
the case of Moore's Poems, corrupting our morals--if they were
denouncing our religious principles, or attacking those political
principles on which our Government subsists--let them be criticised
without mercy. The _salus publica_ demands the sacrifice. But to make an
individual ridiculous merely because he has written a foolish, if it be
a harmless book, is not, I think, justifiable on any moral principle ...
I repeat my principle. Whatever tends to vitiate our literary taste, our
morals, our religious or political principles, may be fairly at the
mercy of criticism. So, whatever tends to introduce false science, false
history, indeed, falsehood in any shape, exposes itself to the censor's
rod. But harmless, inoffensive works should be passed by. Where is the
bravery of treading on a worm or crushing a poor fly? Where the utility?
Where the honour?"

An edition of 4,000 copies had been printed; this was soon exhausted,
and a second edition was called for.

Mr. Scott was ample in his encouragements.

"I think," he wrote to Murray, "a firm and stable sale will be settled
here, to the extent of 1,000 or 1,500 even for the next number.... I am
quite pleased with my ten guineas a sheet for my labour in writing, and
for additional exertions. I will consider them as overpaid by success in
the cause, especially while that success is doubtful."

Ballantyne wrote to Murray in March:

"Constable, I am told, has consulted Sir Samuel Romilly, and means,
after writing a book against me, to prosecute me for _stealing his
plans!_ Somebody has certainly stolen his brains!"

The confederates continued to encourage each other and to incite to
greater effort the procrastinating Gifford. The following rather
mysterious paragraph occurs in a letter from Scott to Murray dated March
19, 1809.

"I have found means to get at M