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 10 INTRODUCTION

able Joseph T. Buckingham seemed to make that complaint in his behalf in the "Evening Transcript" of February 15, 1856, wrote this note in a private copy of his own : "This is, perhaps, hardly fair to Mr. Jewett, because the work is a private one, and Mr. Jewett's offer to purchase the right of publishing was not accepted by the author. Jewett's puff- ing system is a real mischief to an honest literature, and an author of self-respect would hardly submit to it ; still I do not know that he is less liberal than other publishers. I am told that none will advertise on a mere commission."

But, happening to step into the store where his book was announced to be on sale, and finding no copies there which were not hidden under the counter, the poet ordered all the remaining copies of the edition to be sent to his own residence, and gave them away privately to any persons who desired to read them. Possibly these facts may lend new interest to the introductory poem, "The Author to his Book in Early Spring," and the lines "to the Reader." They show, at least, how singularly sincere were the senti- ments there expressed.

But the poems thus noiselessly dropped into the noisy river of modern literature did not altogether fail to reach appreciative minds. Despite the disadvantages of slovenly printing and (it must be confessed) occasional slovenliness of composition, despite some technical defects of structure, form, and expression, and the graver defect of a too fre- quent lapse into the monotone of didacticism, there was yet something in the "Consolations of Solitude" which arrested and held the admiration of undoubtedly competent judges — something of power, originality, beauty, wisdom, true inspiration, which must still charm those who can dis- cern what is most precious in literature. It is altogether fitting, and in truth a sacred duty to the dead, to preserve

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