The arrangement brought reputation
to the magazine (which was published in the days when the honor of being
in print was supposed by the publisher to be ample compensation to the
scribe), but little profit to Mr. Irving. During this period he
interested himself in an international copyright, as a means of fostering
our young literature. He found that a work of merit, written by an
American who had not established a commanding name in the market, met
very cavalier treatment from our publishers, who frankly said that they
need not trouble themselves about native works, when they could pick up
every day successful books from the British press, for which they had to
pay no copyright. Irving's advocacy of the proposed law was entirely
unselfish, for his own market was secure.
His chief works in these ten years were, "A Tour on the Prairies,"
"Recollections of Abbotsford and Newstead Abbey," "The Legends of the
Conquest of Spain," "Astoria" (the heavy part of the work of it was done
by his nephew Pierre), "Captain Bonneville," and a number of graceful
occasional papers, collected afterwards under the title of "Wolfert's
Roost." Two other books may properly be mentioned here, although they
did not appear until after his return from his absence of four years and
a half at the court of Madrid; these are the "Biography of Goldsmith" and
"Mahomet and his Successors.
Pages:
4244
4245
4246
4247
4248
4249
4250
4251
4252
4253
4254
4255
4256
4257
4258
4259
4260
4261
4262
4263
4264
4265
4266
4267
4268