declared in an advertisement that “the copy from which the present edition is printed, was sent from Edinburgh previous to the publication of the work there.”15 Advance sheets were apparently up for grabs.
Hurst, Robinson hurried and soon acquired Ivanhoe for their agent, Wardle, who sold it to Mathew Carey. By then, the Edinburgh publishers had a new term for advance sheets—the “American Copy,” as Cadell put it in numerous letters to Constable.16 The practice of transmitting sheets via Hurst, Robinson and Wardle continued with The Monastery, The Abbot, Kenilworth (1821), The Pirate (1821), and The Fortunes of Nigel (1822). Each volume was shipped as soon as it was printed. Carey could therefore expect the three volumes of a single work to arrive on separate ships, sometimes over the course of a few weeks or months, and he printed each volume as it arrived. Beginning with Kenilworth, Carey previewed each new Waverley novel in the Philadelphia paper The National Gazette by printing excerpts when he received the first shipment. As insurance while dealing with Wardle, Carey continued to instruct John Miller to send complete copies of the novels from London when they were published. In a few cases, the arrival of Miller’s copy proved crucial, since the arrangement with Wardle was tenuous and sometimes unreliable.17
A direct agreement between Carey’s and Constable’s firms emerged out of a heated dispute in 1822 between the two junior partners, Henry Carey and Robert Cadell, over this indirect process of acquisition. These junior partners were far more interested in exploring the transatlantic arrangements than their seniors. In 1817, Cadell wrote with great optimism to Constable about selling books in America, and in 1822, he declared that “with good management we may get a good thing from America—the Pirate has set them all at us.”18 The epistolary exchange that established the agreement is more significant than David Kaser, its only other commentator, suggested when he considered it half a century ago.19 Not only did it bring the firms together, as Kaser notes, but it also reveals dynamics and frustrations endemic to provincial publishing, as London remained a problem and professional alliances proved both alluring and troublesome. In the letters, the younger Carey and Cadell exhibited a fascinating combination of hostility and desire. The demand for Scott’s novels lent urgency to the matter, while the lack of copyright regulations meant that honor, courtesy, and pride provided the rules of conduct.
In the spring of 1822, Constable and Cadell heard a rumor, eventually proved false, that a reprinter in Philadelphia was purchasing advance sheets of the Waverley novels from a thief in the Ballantyne printing house. On April 27, Cadell wrote to Carey & Sons accusing them of this illegitimate method of acquisition, suggesting it had not occurred to him that they could have been the beneficiaries of Hurst, Robinson’s connections with Wardle. Cadell’s letter is remarkably harsh in its tone and presumption of guilt:
We now address you in consequence of being put in possession of information, that you have for some years, and are now, in the way of procuring the sheets of the new works published by us from the pen of the Author of Waverly [sic], through the means of some one of the workmen in the Printing Office where the productions of that Author are printed.
It may at present be sufficient to state, that we have taken means to put a stop to so irregular a proceeding, and if you suffer any disappointment in the matter, it will mainly arise from the course you have pursued being one of great uncertainty, to say nothing of the gross want of honesty in the person so transmitting early copies of the sheets to you.20
Although it was the thief in the shop whom Cadell accused of “gross” dishonesty, the insult overflowed onto Carey himself, embroiled as he allegedly was in such an “irregular” proceeding. Cadell’s arrogance is manifest in his certainty of Carey’s guilt, his own ability to “put a stop” to the crime, and the implicit lesson he wished to teach the American about how to behave like a gentleman bookseller. His anger derived not only from the apparent violation of Ballantyne’s printing office—still closely guarded to protect Scott’s anonymity—but, as quickly becomes clear, from the injustice of missing out on the transaction. He questioned not the propriety of Carey’s procuring advance sheets, just his supposed method of acquisition. Cadell wanted the money himself: “[We] have no objections to treat with you or any respectable house for the privilege of any early dispatch we make of the sheets of any work of this author; there will be many more productions from the same pen, and if it is any object to you to have the early possession of such works surely it is to you greatly more certain to transact direct with the proprietors than through any disrespectable channel, but perhaps you are not aware of the source from which you procure the sheets being irregular.”21 The concession he made at the end of this passage merely trades the presumption of dishonesty for one of ignorance and does little to mitigate the accusation that Carey was flouting common courtesies of the trade. In the absence of an actionable legal offence, Cadell reasserted his firm’s ownership of the Waverley novels and resorted to shame as a disciplinary tactic.
In the rest of the letter, he suggested that Carey purchase the sheets from him, an ironic move given his disdain for Carey’s supposed methods. Cadell reported that he initially heard about the stolen sheets from a publisher in Baltimore who had written to him about the rumor and offered to purchase subsequent sheets himself. Cadell passed over the request from Baltimore and offered the deal instead to the offensive Philadelphians, whose enterprising negotiation of the marketplace Cadell seemed, despite himself, to admire. “[I]f as that letter [from Baltimore] states you have successfully brought out many of these books in succession,” he wrote, “we think there is a better chance of your understanding the matter than any person in a great degree unacquainted with it”; should they come to terms, he could “forward any portion of any new work.”22 It was precisely within the apparent irregularity of Carey’s practices that Cadell found evidence of his competency. In showing his own preference for the experienced Philadelphia firm, furthermore, Cadell betrayed his firm’s own preference—quite outside economic motivations—that the Waverley novels receive a “respectable” edition in the United States.
Upon receipt of this letter, Henry Carey was immediately concerned with defending his firm (now H. Carey & Lea), a simple task given the facts of the case but also an urgent one given the great potential of establishing a new relationship with Edinburgh. The letter he wrote in response, addressed to Archibald Constable, gave a full explanation of his actual practice, including the amount he paid Wardle for each novel, though he did not name Hurst, Robinson in order to avoid “any difficulty between you and them.” The letter is notable for both offended pride and solicitation. The backhanded preference Constable & Company showed for Carey over the gossipy Baltimore firm may have been an additional provocation over and above his actual innocence:
Had you known us at the time you wrote that letter we presume you would not have thrown out the ideas it contains with regard to our obtaining the books in the manner you speak of. Where we are known we do not imagine any such charge could be thought of as we have endeavored to conduct our business with as much regard to correctness as any house in this Country. Messr Longman & Co—Mr Miller … are our correspondents in London, to them you may refer for any information that you may desire respecting us. We mention these names from a desire that the impression you have received may be effaced. Had such a charge come from any person who had an opportunity of knowing us, we should hardly have considered it entitled to refutation.23
Carey’s frustration is palpable in the repeated invocation of his firm’s obscurity (“Had you known us,” and so on). As Everton has written, “The rank of a printer or publisher depended on his character and reputation in trade.”24 Such a reputation was not easily acquired across the Atlantic. Of course, Carey was disingenuous to claim that Constable’s ignorance was the only reason he deigned to refute this charge. The stakes were quite high, as a direct arrangement with Constable & Company could finally give him the real advantage he wanted in the reprint market and also solve continuing difficulties with his indirect London connection.
However disguised, the high stakes are revealed in the
