been that of a publisher and a writer. But, in the course of my long connection with the Press (I use this word in its most extended meaning), I have been brought into communication with many eminent persons, and have been somewhat extensively mixed up with vast changes in the social condition of the people, in the progress of which elementary education and popular literature have been amongst the most efficient instruments of amelioration.

But before I start upon a long journey-broken, however, into several stages,-it may give a completeness to my narrative if I put together some earlier Reminiscences of circumstances by which I was surrounded, from the beginning of the century, in my childhood and my advance to manhood. The first steps of self-formation are, I think, always interesting-to follow, however uneventful may be the subsequent career of an individual. But my early days at Windsor have a wider interest, as they made me familiar with the outward manifestations of the simple life of George the Third and his Court an old-fashioned life of publicity, which wholly passed away in the seclusion of the next reign, when the King was seldom seen by his people, much less living among them in a sort of family intimacy, such as I had looked upon from my humble point of observation. In 1810, the regal aspect of Windsor was wholly changed by the illness of the King. In 1812, when I put on the

responsibilities of full age, the Regent was invested with unrestricted power. There never was a more eventful period in the history of our country than the first twelve years of the Nineteenth Century. They were calculated to produce a strong and abiding impression upon the mind of a thoughtful youth, whose local associations were suggestive of past dangers and triumphs-of the Blenheim of Anne and the Crecy of Edward. Moreover, as I advanced towards manhood, there was an outburst of literature, which stirred my spirit with a new power. If, in recording my impressions of this memorable era, I should be able to recal some of the enthusiasm of the passing time, I may not be without the hope of imparting an interest to the Reminiscences of a solitary boy and an obscure young man.

The half-century of active employment which I look back upon is divided, in my retrospection, into three epochs. I shall regard them as stages in my journey of life; not always caring thus to measure my progress by any extreme nicety of dates; and not suddenly halting when the interest of a subject carries me forward to its natural close.

But

I. From 1812 to the end of 1822, my chief occupation was that of a journalist at Windsor. my duties were not wholly limited to that narrow range, although in tracing my course as the editor of a local paper I may regard some circumstances as of peculiar interest. The political aspects of that

period are not pleasant to review; when the thoughtful man saw as much to be apprehended from an unsympathising Government as from a discontented people. In 1820 I made my first attempt in publishing a Cheap Miscellany; and I have to estimate what Popular Literature was, at a period when the majority looked upon Books for the Many as a very dangerous experiment in giving a direction to the newly-diffused art of reading. At this period, also, of strong political excitement, I was induced to accept the editorship of a London Weekly Newspaper. My area of observation was thus somewhat enlarged. My aim was to make "The Guardian" as much a literary as a political paper; and I thus incidentally acquired a familiarity with the Periodical Literature of a time when Magazines were becoming more original and more influential. I also gained some insight into the general commerce of books in that closing era of high prices. During this period one of the pleasantest occupations of my Windsor life opened to me, as the printer and publisher of "The Etonian." This circumstance led to my intercourse with that most remarkable knot of Cambridge students who became the chief contributors to "Knight's Quarterly Magazine." It may be sufficient to mention the names of Macaulay, Praed, Sidney Walker, Henry Nelson Coleridge (of these I may, unhappily, speak without reserve), and add those of Derwent Coleridge, Henry Malden, and John Moultrie, to give an abiding interest to such

remembrances.

"The Quarterly Magazine" chiefly led to my establishment as a London publisher in the season of 1823. Through this year, and in 1824, I was occupied in the literary and commercial management of that work, which was concluded after the publication of six numbers. A second series was subsequently undertaken; but this attempt at a revival was of too solid a character fitly to succeed its brilliant predecessor.

II. I had been gradually extending my field of business as a publisher of Miscellaneous Books, and was not without the support of persons of reputation and influence. Yet my experience of the risk of miscellaneous publishing became in a year or two somewhat discouraging. In 1826, I had to struggle, in common with many others of my craft, against the depression in value of all literary property. But in this period of difficulty I was endeavouring to mature several plans for wholly and systematically devoting myself to cheap Popular Literature. Some of the seed thus prepared was ultimately sown.

In 1827 I became connected with the Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge; and soon after edited and published "The British Almanac" and "Companion," and "The Library of Entertaining Knowledge." Through twenty years—until, indeed, the Society thought that the time was come when individual enterprise would accomplish all that they had attempted-I was more or less connected with this memorable Association. My remembrances will

embrace whatever, without violation of confidence, may be related of this connection. I need not here particularise the eminent persons with whom I was brought into contact, in carrying forward the works which were entrusted to my care as Publisher, and in several cases as Editor. Other important works were undertaken by me without the support of the Society's reputation. I availed myself—perhaps more than most of the publishers of that period-of the revived process of wood-engraving, to diffuse popular Art as well as popular Literature. In this species of enterprise "The Penny Magazine" led the way. "The Pictorial Bible" was the most successful of the more permanent class of such publications; the "Thousand and one Nights" was the most beautiful. The "Pictorial History of England" was followed by the "Pictorial Shakspere," which was the most congenial undertaking of my literary life; and then by the "London." This series of years, which brought with them unabated literary labour and most anxious commercial responsibility, were not without their enjoyments of pleasant and remunerating work. They afforded me the consolation that I was performing a public good, when I bore up, unaided, under the heavy load of "The Penny Cyclopædia," overweighted by taxation. This was the most busy and the most interesting period of my working life; and its interest is heightened beyond measure to myself by the consideration that this epoch was the great turning-point in our poli