William Hone to John Childs, 3 February, 1819 An Electronic Edition William Hone Kyle Grimes

For publication in the Hone Correspondence section of the William Hone BioText, http://honearchive.org. The letter is published under a Creative Commons license, details of which are accessible from the BioText homepage.

Hackwood, pp. 211-12; I have not been able to locate the original manuscript for this letter, though, given the connections with the ongoing Hone/Childs conversation, I have confidence that the content is likely accurate. (Unfortunately, many of the letters quoted in Hackwood's biography have not been located.)

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William Hone to John Childs, 3 February, 1819.Hackwood, pp. 211-12. For a detailed, contextual reading of this letter, see the "Conversation" on the early friendship of Hone and Childs. [return] — -TEI-
Ludgate Hill,
3rd. Feb. 1819. My dear Sir,

Yesterday I could not get off the Notes on account of a spurt which ran us out before I was aware of it — to-day you have £2 worth enclosed.

Your kind offer of prospectus-using I most thankfully embrace; indeed, such have been my troubles of the brain that if I fail in my undertaking, it would not be wonderful to myself.

Could I be persuaded of realising something like certainty for my wife, and be assured that my children would be so placed in the world as to give her no uneasiness for their fate, I could pass with cheerfulness to 'where the weary are at rest and where the wicked cease from troubling.'The lines, slightly misquoted, make up the refrain from Henry Hart Milman's "Burial Hymn." [return] Perhaps water drinking and sunshine and good digestion, and a conscience void of offence towards God and man, may dispel some of the perilous stuff about my heart, and yet it has increased on me of late till sense has nearly suffocated—I feel that my mind is not as it ought to be, I am very miserable and for want of a friend to sympathise with, carry about my burden unseen and in silence.

Old De Foe is a man after my own heart, respecting whom and his works I know more, perhaps, than any other living admirer of him—his 'Jure Divino' is indeed a famous old book, and yet I fear would not (I wish it would) bear re-printing.For further commentary on both Childs's and Hone's interest in Defoe, see the Introduction to Hone's edition of The Right Divine of Kings to Govern Wrong!.

I dined at John Hunt's on Sunday with Mr. Hazlitt, for whose work on the prospectus I have just concluded a bargain, and given Mr. Creery this morning copy to begin withThe persons mentioned here are John Hunt (brother of Leigh Hunt and co-publisher of The Examiner), William Hazlitt (essayist and political writer; Hone would publish Hazlitt's Political Essays, with Sketches of Public Characters later in 1819), and John McCreary (sometimes "McCreery" or "M'Creery" or just "Creery"; a printer and long-time friend of Hone's). [return] — Hazlitt is a De Foeite.

The affair of the Bible prosecutions instituted by Strahan & Spottiswoode, King's printers, might be made of great service to the booksellers. I am morally certain that by firm co-operation and stout attack, the patent might be thrown open.The reference here is to contoversy regarding the bible-publishing patent in England. Publication of the Bible was restricted to just three presses: the "King's Printer," Oxford, and Cambridge. Many—especially among the dissenters—were unhappy with this state monopoly and both Hone (with his Apocryphal New Testament in 1820) and Childs (with his court testimony and principled stand against the Church Rates in the 1830s) were to take active roles in challenging that patent. [return] —The Booksellers' Committee meet and enquire, and enquire and meet, and will make a Report which will end in smoke.

My wife presents her respects to Mrs. Childs. I am rather late for the mail.

I am, My dear Sir Yours most truly, W. Hone

Mr. John Childs.