of
men, and the most amiable of publishers; and I can conceive that few of
the more legitimate craft would be able to stand upon dignity, or refuse
his kind invitation to meet a little company at his board--

"At the close of the day, when the market is still,
And mortals the sweets of comestibles prove."

But hold! When is the market still. For a fortnight after he has set it
astir with a new number, his announcements confront you as you open your
"folio of four pages." His placards smite the eye at the crossings of
the streets; they return your glance at the shop-window, and confound
your senses at every turn. "Old Ebony for the month,"--"Kit North again
in the field,"--"A racy new number of _Blackwood_,"--such are the
headings of newspaper puffs, and the bawlings of hawkers on the steps of
Astor House. They pursue you to the Boston railway-station, or to the
Hudson-river steamer; they follow you on the road to Niagara; meet you
afresh at Detroit and Chicago, and hardly provoke any additional
surprise when the bagman accosts you with the same syllables, through
the nose, as you arrive in the buffalo-season on the debateable grounds
of Oregon! To quote once more the oracular words of the Ettrick orator
and poet, "Ane gets tired o' that eternal soun'--_Blackwood's
Magazeen,--Blackwood's Magazeen_--dinnin' in ane's lugs, day and nicht!"
So vast and so varied I suppose to be the commercial relations of
Reprint & Co., and such, beyond a doubt, is Maga's empire in America.

No more by this steamer. Let me see; in ten days, perhaps, Harry will be
with you at breakfast, discussing my letter, and lamenting my lot, to
live so far from the world. For me, however, a contented disposition,
the steamers twice a-month, and _Blackwood_ monthly, do wonders. I see
as much of the world as a good man need wish to see; and at any time,
you know, it's not a fortnight's work, by God's blessing, to rejoin the
old friends and true friends, that so often go fishing under your
patronage, and tell improbable stories around your table. Wait till I
get into my own chair beside you, and I will tell stories of my sojourn
in America that will put Harry's Indian romances to the blush. He now
goes out with a stock of prairie-adventures, that out-Sinbad Sinbad, and
yet he tells them with an air of honesty that would gull Gulliver. Wait
till I rejoin you, and you shall see how a plain tale will put him down.