Volume 1 - Electric Scotland

AN UNPUNCTUAL CONTRIBUTOR. 425
yourself. It was the knowing what you could do if you were
once resolved to do which made my repeated disappointments so
very mortifying to me. This is now all happily over, because,
as the French say, the first step is the grand affair.
Mr Blackwood, the reader will perceive, always
insisted upon the point that his contributors should
do justice to themselves. With a fine pride he ignores
the possibility of any ineptitude on their part injuring
the Magazine. That they should do the best for
themselves, and vindicate their own character and
gifts, is what he always implores with emotion in
his voice. The reader will remember his almost
impassioned entreaties of the same kind to both
Lockhart and Wilson. As early as the beginning
of the next year, however, he had begun to see how
slippery the new contributor was, and the following
letter was evidently intended, like the sharp clap of
the bladder in Swift's Laputa, to bring the philosopher
to a sense of the waking necessities of earth :
W. Blackwood to T. Be Quincey.
—
6 January 1821,
I must tell you frankly at once that your mode of furnishing
articles will neither answer your own purpose nor mine. For
instance, this article which you have not yet finished you positively
promised to have with me complete on Tuesday by two
o'clock. No doubt you may have had many unavoidable causes
for the delay : still, this is nothing to a man of business, who,
as he adheres to his own engagements, expects equal punctuality
in those who engage with him. It is quite unnecessary, as I
have again and again told you, to make any inquiry as to whether
an article will be in time. A good article is always in time.
I hope you will send me, as you again promised, the remainder
of your article this evening, and the more you can do
next week of any others so much the better.