AND

RECOLLECTIONS OF EDITORIAL LIFE.

BY

JOSEPH T. BUCKINGHAM.

IN TWO VOLUMES.

VOL. I.

BOSTON:

TICKNOR, REED, AND FIELDS.

M DCCC LII.

Entered according to the Act of Congress, in the year 1852, by

In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the District of Massachusetts.

PRINTED BY THURSTON, TORRY, AND EMERSON.

It is a hard and a nice subject for a man to write of himself. It pains his own heart to say any thing of disparagement, and the reader's ears to hear any thing of praise from him. There is no danger from me of my offending him in that kind; neither my mind nor my body, nor my fortune, allow me any materials for that vanity. COWLEY.

Grateful, as I am, to the GRACIOUS BEING, without whom I and my faculties are nothing, I feel no disposition to affront his bounty by assuming the language of hypocritical humility. Venerating TRUTH above all earthly things, I can think and speak of myself as well as of other men, without malice and without extenuation. I will never incur a real imputation of dissimulation and ingratitude, by adopting a silly affectation to avoid the mere appearance of conceit. GILBERT WAKEFIELD.

Nor Fame I slight, nor for her favors call,
She comes unlooked for, if she comes at all:
But if the purchase cost so dear a price
As soothing Folly, or exalting Vice, -
If pen and press must flatter lawless Sway,
And follow still where Fortune leads the way,-
Or, if no basis bear my rising name

But the fallen ruins of another's fame,

Then, teach me, Heaven, to scorn the guilty bays;
Drive from my breast that wretched lust of praise ;
Unblemished let me live, or die unknown;
O grant me honest Fame, or grant me none !

M126116

POPE.

PERSONAL MEMOIRS.

I AM about to commit what may, by some, be called an act of folly. Wiser and more learned men have been guilty of a like indiscretion, and have been forgiven. In the estimation of the world, their example will be no apology for this display of egotism. The fact is referred to merely to remind those, who may smile at the vanity or sneer at the impertinence of my performance, that one, who sins in company with the learned and the wise, may enjoy, in himself, the consolation which arises from the hope that his punishment may be inflicted with a gentler hand than if he had stood alone in his guilt. I lay this " flattering unction to my soul, and leave the consequence to the justice and the mercy of the reader.

Some of my friends, who have read and kindly approved my "Specimens of Newspaper Literature, with Personal Memoirs, Anecdotes, and Reminiscences," claim the fulfilment of a conditional pledge, made