Gibson that they desire 1000 of the 8vo
edition of _St. Ronan's Well,_ and the subsequent series of Novels
thereunto belonging, for that they have only _seven_ remaining, and wish
it to be sent to their printers, and pushed out in three months. Thus
this great house, without giving any previous notice of the state of the
sale, expect all to be boot and saddle, horse and away, whenever they
give the signal. In the present case this may do, because I will make
neither alteration nor addition till our grand _opus_, the Improved
Edition, goes to press. But ought we to go to press with this 1000
copies knowing that our project will supersede and render equivalent to
waste paper such of them as may not reach the public before our plan is
publicly known and begins to operate? I have, I acknowledge, doubt as to
this. No doubt I feel perfectly justified in letting Longman and Co.
look to their own interest, since they have neither consulted me nor
attended to mine. But the loss might extend to the retail booksellers;
and to hurt the men through whom my works are ultimately to find their
way to the public would be both unjust and impolitic. On the contrary,
if the _St. Ronan_ Series be hurried out immediately, there is time
enough perhaps to sell it off before the Improved Edition appears. In
the meantime it appears that the popularity of these works is increasing
rather than diminishing, that the measure of securing the copyrights was
most judicious, and that, with proper management, things will work
themselves round. Successful first editions are good, but they require
exertion and imply fresh risk of reputation. But repeated editions tell
only to the agreeable part of literature.[112]

Longman and Company have also at length opened their oracular jaws on
the subject of _Bonaparte_, and acknowledged its rapid sale, and the
probable exhaustion of the present edition.

These tidings, with the success of the _Tales_, "speak of Africa and
golden joys."[113] But the tidings arriving after dinner rather
discomposed me. In the evening I wrote to Cadell and Ballantyne at
length, proposing a meeting at my house on Tuesday first, to hold a
privy council.

_January_ 9.--My first reflection was on Napoleon. I will not be hurried
in my corrections of that work; and that I may not be so, I will begin
them the instant that I have finished the review. It makes me tremble to
think of the mass of letters I have to look through in order to sele