Volume 1 - Electric Scotland

226 WILLIAM BLACKWOOD.
say that the enclosed Essay i has cost me a great deal of time
and thought, and that if it be printed in the Magazine I shall
consider myself entitled to be paid for it upon quite a different
footing than from usual articles.
I am of opinion that such a view of such a subject would at
this particular time attract great notice even in the highest
quarters ; and really that important practical results might
follow. It is possible that all this is sanguine nonsense in
me ; but, however, I beg you to read my paper and state your
feeling.
Mr Blackwood's reply was full of enthusiastic
praise of the article ; but his letter does not seem to
have been at all satisfactory to his correspondent.
Lockhart replied briefly, explaining that he had not
originally designed the article in question for the
Magazine, and requesting its return : a communica-
tion which called forth the following reply :
W. Blackwood to J. G. Lockhart.
—
\Uh June 1825.
I am quite aware that the article you were so good as to send
me was the result of knowledge and experience which few pos-
sessed, and that therefore anything I could offer in the shape
of money was not adequate to its intrinsic worth. I felt proud
in receiving the article, as a mark of friendship to myself as
well as of the deep interest you continued to take in my
Magazine, and I trusted that by means of it and others the
work would receive such an impulse that I should very soon
have it in my power to show you substantially that I was not
insensible of what you had done for me. I certainly did look
forward with some confidence to being able to pay all your
articles in future at a higher rate than it had hitherto been in
my power to do. To pay you, as I have already said, I could
not; but I flattered myself that, independent of the interest
you take in my Magazine, its very success would prompt you
to write articles when you did not feel inclined to do anything
1 Probably an Essay on Universities.