Page:A history of booksellers, the old and the new.djvu/413

373 KELLY AND VIRTUE. 373 about the year 1820. At first his trade consisted en- tirely in the retail business, but by degrees he was able to purchase entire remainders of that distinct class of religious publications which were then sold chiefly in numbers. These he re-issued ; and as he did his own canvassing, no zeal was wanting in the service, and his success was by no means indifferent. Once established, he was able to canvass for the books of other pub- lishers ; and on the I5th July, 1821, the first number of a work was published, which took the town by storm. Whether Mr. Virtue's canvassing powers were acknowledged by the trade at this early period, or whether his peculiar class of customers was considered as most amenable to the work in question, we know not, but he was given an interest of one kind or another, either as part proprietor or as a purchaser on unusually liberal terms in the famous " Life in London ; or, the Adventures of Tom and Jerry," issued by Sherwood, Neeley, and Jones, of Paternoster Row. The book was written by Pierce Egan, afterwards the founder of Bell's Life. Works describing country sports and pastimes had proved so acceptable that it was imagined that a volume issued in numbers, setting forth the humours of town life would be equally taking. The illus- trations by J. R. and George Cruikshank proved irre- sistible. The work was so successful that innumerable imitations appeared, one of which (" Shade of Lack- ington !") was published by Jones and Co., who occu- pied his former place of business, the " Temple of the Muses " in Finsbury Square. There was absolutely a furore for the work. Dibdin, Barryman, Farell, Dou- glas Jerrold, Moncrieff, and others adapted it for the stage. It was on the boards of ten theatres at one