thor to state his own price for the
copyright, and Mr. Milman wrote:

"I am totally at a loss to fix one. I think I might decide whether an
offer were exceedingly high or exceedingly low, whether a Byron or Scott
price, or such as is given to the first essay of a new author. Though
the 'Fall of Jerusalem' might demand an Israelitish bargain, yet I shall
not be a Jew further than my poetry. Make a liberal offer, such as the
prospect will warrant, and I will at once reply, but I am neither able
nor inclined to name a price.... As I am at present not very far
advanced in life, I may hereafter have further dealings with the Press,
and, of course, where I meet with liberality shall hope to make a return
in the same way. It has been rather a favourite scheme of mine, though
this drama cannot appear on the boards, to show it before it is
published to my friend Mrs. Siddons, who perhaps might like to read it,
either at home or abroad. I have not even hinted at such a thing to her,
so that this is mere uncertainty, and, before it is printed, it would be
in vain to think of it, as the old lady's eyes and MS. could never agree
together.

"P.S.--I ought to have said that I am very glad of Aristarchus'
[Grifford's] approval. And, by the way, I think, if I help you in
redeeming your character from 'Don Juan,' the 'Hetaerse' in the
_Quarterly_, [Footnote: Mitchell's article on "Female Society in
Greece," _Q.R._ No. 43.] etc., you ought to estimate that very highly."

Mr. Murray offered Mr. Milman five hundred guineas for the copyright,
to which the author replied: "Your offer appears to me very fair, and I
shall have no scruple in acceding to it."

Milman, in addition to numerous plays and poems, became a contributor to
the _Quarterly_, and one of Murray's historians. He wrote the "History
of the Jews" and the "History of Christianity"; he edited Gibbon and
Horace, and continued during his lifetime to be one of Mr. Murray's most
intimate and attached friends.

In 1820 we find the first mention of a name afterwards to become as
celebrated as any of those with which Mr. Murray was associated. Owing
to the warm friendship which existed between the Murrays and the
D'Israelis, the younger members of both families were constantly brought
together on the most intimate terms. Mr. Murray was among the first to
mark the abilities of the boy, Benjamin Disraeli, and, as would appear
from the subjoined letter, his confidence in his abilities