quote from the statement:--

"So far as 1836, Bradbury and Evans had business relations with Mr.
Dickens, and, in 1844, an agreement was entered into by which they
acquired an interest in all the works he might write, or in any
periodical he might originate, during a term of seven years. Under
this agreement Bradbury and Evans became possessed of a joint,
though unequal, interest with Mr. Dickens in 'Household Words,'
commenced in 1850. Friendly relations had simultaneously sprung up
between them, and they were on terms of close intimacy in 1858,
when circumstances led to Mr. Dickens's publication of a statement,
on the subject of his conjugal differences, in various newspapers,
including 'Household Words' of June 12th.

"The public disclosure of these differences took most people by
surprise, and was notoriously the subject of comments, by no means
complimentary to Mr. Dickens himself, as regarded the taste of this
proceeding. On June 17th, however, Bradbury and Evans learnt from a
common friend, that Mr. Dickens had resolved to break off his
connection with them, because this statement was not printed in the
number of _Punch_ published the day preceding--in other words,
because it did not occur to Bradbury and Evans to exceed their
legitimate functions as proprietors and publishers, and to require
the insertion of statements on a domestic and painful subject in
the inappropriate columns of a comic miscellany. No previous
request for the insertion of this statement had been made either to
Bradbury and Evans, or to the editor of _Punch_, and the grievance
of Mr. Dickens substantially amounted to this, that Bradbury and
Evans did not take upon themselves, unsolicited, to gratify an
eccentric wish by a preposterous action.... Bradbury and Evans
replied that they did not, and could not, believe that this was the
sole cause of Mr. Dickens's altered feeling towards them; but they
were assured that it _was_ the sole cause, and that Mr. Dickens
desired to bear testimony to their integrity and zeal as his
publishers, but that his resolution was formed, and nothing could
alter it."

So this foolish estrangement went on until, years afterwards, Clarkson
Stanfield on his death-bed besought Dickens to resume his friendship
with the man with whom, after all, he had had