n in January, 1843, of _Miss Leslie's Magazine_. In the
address of "The Publisher to the Public" the new venture is thus
introduced and commended: "_Miss Leslie's Magazine_! There is something
in the very name that foretokens a prosperous career. It is a name
associated with the pleasantest passages of our current American
literature--with the most brilliant triumphs of our most brilliant
periodicals. Who does not remember 'Mrs. Washington Potts' and that
exquisite tease, 'Old Aunt Quinby,' and the 'Miss Vanlears,' and their
pseudo-French gallant; and 'Mrs. Woodbridge,' and her economical mamma,
and the thousand other creations of Miss Leslie's admirable pencil; and
remembering these, who would not venture to predict that her magazine
must be eminently successful? _We_ know that it will be." The first
number contained contributions by T. S. Arthur, Mrs. Anna Bache, N. P.
Willis, Virginia Murray, John Bouvier, Mrs. L. H. Sigourney, Morton
McMichael and Mrs. S. C. Hall.

Again, in February, the publisher advanced before the public with a
modest little speech: "We foresaw that our magazine would create a
sensation, but we had no idea that it would produce such a commotion as
it has done. Everybody is in rapture with it, and the whole town has
been crowding to get a peep at it--for, to say the truth, such has been
the demand that we could not possibly keep pace with it.... We have
already received a larger number of actual subscriptions than were ever
before obtained for any periodical in the same period; and we do not
hazard anything in predicting that before the expiration of our first
year we shall have a greater circulation than any other monthly
publication.... And then our contributors are all persons of genuine
merit--men and women who write understandingly, and who know how to
mingle entertainment with profit. No mawkish sentimentality--no diluted
commonplaces--no pompous parade of swollen words--no tumid prosiness can
find admission into our columns, for we shall avoid alike the hackneyed
author whose reputation takes the place of ability, and the unfledged
scribbler whose crudities are utter abominations. We care nothing for
mere names, though a good deed is none the worse for coming from a good
hand; but the small fry of literature--the lackadaisical
geniuses--Heaven bless the mark--who, scum-like, float upon the surface,
soiling what they touch and disturbing by their presence what, but for
them, might be free f