Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 57.djvu/43

Tonson ultimately appeared in Tonson's sixth 'Miscellany' (May 1709). Wycherley wrote that Tonson had long been gentleman-usher to the Muses: 'you will make Jacob's ladder raise you to immortality' (, Works, vi. 37, 40, 72, ix. 545).

Rowe's edition of Shakespeare, in six volumes, was published early in 1709 by Tonson, who had previously advertised for materials (, Encyclopædia, p. 593). Steele dined at Tonson's in 1708-9, sometimes to get a bill discounted, sometimes to hear manuscripts read and advise upon them (, Life of Steele, i. 204, 235). There is a tradition that in earlier days Steele had had a daughter by a daughter of Tonson's; if this is true, it must apparently have been a daughter of Richard Tonson, Jacob's brother. In the autumn of 1710 Tonson moved to the Shakespeare's Head, opposite Catherine Street in the Strand; his former shop at Gray's Inn Gate was announced for sale in the 'Tatler' for 14 Oct. (No. 237); and it seems to have been taken by Thomas Osborne, stationer, the father of the afterwards well-known publisher, Thomas Osborne (d. 1767) [q. v.] On 26 July 1711, after a long interval, Swift met Addison and Steele 'at young Jacob Tonson's.' 'The two Jacobs,' says Swift to Esther Johnson, 'think it I who have made the secretary take from them the printing of the Gazette, which they are going to lose.... Jacob came to me t'other day to make his court; but I told him it was too late, and that it was not my doing.' Accounts furnished to Steele by Tonson of the sale of the collective editions of the 'Tatler ' and 'Spectator' have been preserved (, Life of Steele, i. 329-31); from October 1712 Tonson's name was joined with Samuel Buckley's as publisher of the 'Spectator.' In November 1712 Addison and Steele sold all their right and title in one half of the copies of the first seven volumes of the 'Spectator' to Tonson, jun., for 575l., and all rights in the other half for a similar sum to Buckley. Buckley in October 1714 reassigned his half-share in the 'Spectator' to Tonson junior for 500l. (ib. i. 354; Hist.MSS. Comm. 9th Rep. ii. 471).

Tonson published Addison's tragedy, 'Cato,' in April 1713; and, according to a concocted letter of Pope's, the true reason why Steele brought the 'Guardian' to an end in October was a quarrel with Tonson, its publisher; 'he stood engaged to his bookseller in articles of penalty for all the "Guardians," and by desisting two days, and altering the title of the paper to that of the "Englishman," was quit of the obligation, those papers being printed by Buckley.' There are various reasons why this story is improbable; the truth seems to be that Steele was anxious to write on politics with a freer hand than was practicable in the 'Guardian.' In the summer of 1714 we hear of Steele writing political pamphlets at Tonson's, where there were three bottles of wine of Steele's (, Life of Steele, ii. 25, 30), and in October Tonson printed Steele's 'Ladies' Library.' Tonson appears in Rowe's 'Dialogue between Tonson and Congreve, in imitation of Horace,'
 * Thou, Jacob Tonson, were, to my conceiving,
 * The cheerfullest, best, honest fellow living.

In the same year Tonson, with Barnaby Bernard Lintot [q. v.] and William Taylor, was appointed one of the printers of the parliamentary votes. Next year he paid fifty guineas for the copyright of Addison's comedy, 'The Drummer,' and published Tickell's translation of the first book of the 'Iliad,' which gave offence to Pope. On 6 Feb. 1718 Lintot entered into a partnership agreement with Tonson for the purchase of plays during eighteen months following that date.

In one of several amusing letters from Vanbrugh, now at Bayfordbury, Tonson, who was then in Paris, was congratulated upon his luck in South Sea stock, and there is other evidence that he made a large sum in connection with Law's Mississippi scheme. 'He has got 40,000l.,' wrote Robert Arbuthnot; 'riches will make people forget their trade.' In January 1720 Tonson obtained a grant to himself and his nephew of the office of stationer, bookseller, and printer to some of the principal public offices (Pat. 6 George I); and on 12 Oct. 1722 he assigned the whole benefit of the grant to his nephew. The grant was afterwards renewed by Walpole, in 1733, for a second term of forty years (Pat. 6 George II). The elder Tonson seems to have given up business about 1720. He had bought the Hazells estate at Ledbury, Herefordshire ( and, Herefordshire, iii. 100-1), and in 1721 he was sending presents of cider to the Dukes of Grafton and Newcastle, the latter of whom called Tonson 'my dear old friend,' and asked him to give him his company in Sussex (Hist. MSS. Comm. 2nd Rep. pp. 70, 71). Henceforth we may suppose, in the absence of evidence to the contrary, that 'Tonson' in contemporary allusions means the nephew.

Steele's 'Conscious Lovers' appeared in 1722, and Tonson assigned to Lintot halt the copyright for 70l. He had to apply to the court of chancery for an injunction to