The Essence of the Douglas Cause.

"A CHEAP AND HURRIED PIRACY GOT OUT TO UNDERSELL THE GENUINE EDITION"

To which is subjoined Some Observations on a Pamphlet Lately Published intitled Considerations on the Douglas Cause.

 

Second (Pirated Edition). 8vo (215 x 140mm). [4], 77, [3, blank]pp. Title-page dusty, crumpled and dog-eared in places with a pencil signature in the upper blank margin, some minor staining in places but otherwise, internally, a good clean copy, verso of final blank leaf a little browned and grubby, old scrubbed-out library stamp in the blank lower portion of the final leaf of text (almost entirely obliterated, even under a UV light). Uncut and seemingly never bound, old stitching replaced with new.

 

London[?Edinbugh]: for J. Wilkie [?Francis Robertson], 

 

Not in ESTC. Pottle 20. First published by Wilkie in the same year, although the Observations are advertised on the title-page they were removed shortly after publication by Boswell (Pottle only knew of the Harvard copy that preserved them). A second issue of this pirated edition was printed in 1769 (see Pottle).

 

"The book is practically a page for page reprint of the first edition but the division of words and lines is not identical. There are also changes in spelling and punctuation. The printing is very poorly done and swarms with broken letters and typographical errors, the most noticeable of which are the frequent substitutions of 'u' for 'n' and 'n' for 'u': iun-keeper (p.24, 3rd line from bottom); pomponsy (p. 25, l.4 from bottom); Flnratl (p.27, l.8); Inspecteur (p28, l. 12) etc. The presence of the blank leaf at the end following a blank page shows that this edition never really contained the Observations mentioned on the title-page at all, but that the printer set it up from a copy of the first edition from which the Observations had been removed, and had not sense enough to alter the title-page accordingly." (Pottle, p.42)

 

One of the most immediately noticeable differences is the dropped "r" in "Church" in the imprint. 

 

Pottle notes that there is a copy of this edition in the Bodleian Library but that it lacks the final blank leaf (which is present here).

 

"In spite of the imprint, everything points to the fact that this was a pirated edition, probably made by some Scots publisher. If Wilkie had been reprinting the pamphlet, he would certainly have altered the title-page. It is incredible that after publishing Boswell's furious note and after having gone to the expense of cancelling the Observations he should still have printed another edition with the old title-page, although the Observations were actually not contained in the book. The omission of the price on the title-page and the generally inferior appearance of the book indicate that it was a cheap and hurried piracy got out to undersell the genuine edition. That such a piracy was feared is indicated by the advertisement of the Essence in Caledon Merc. 30 Dec. 1767, which adds 'As the above pamphlet is entered in the Stationers-hall, it is hoped no person will presume to reprint or vend the same, or they shall be prosecuted according to law'. The piracy probably appeared at about the time of this advertisement."

 

Pottle suggests that the Edinburgh printer Francis Robertson may have been responsible for this piracy.

Stock Code: 247045