Joseph Munt Langford to John Blackwood, London, 24 December 1872
Title
Joseph Munt Langford to John Blackwood, London, 24 December 1872
Title
Joseph Munt Langford to John Blackwood, London, 24 December 1872
Sender
Joseph Munt Langford
Recipient
John Blackwood
Date(s)
- 1872-12-24
Place
London
Letter Content
Joseph Munt Langford to John Blackwood, London, 24 December 1872
MS: National Library of Scotland. Hitherto unpublished.
Paternoster Row | December 24th 1872.
My dear Sir,
Once more on the eve of another Christmas I write to wish you the compliments of the season and a long continuance of prosperity and of happiness to yourself, Mrs. Blackwood, and the young people. With myself I cannot help feeling that old age is approaching but I am thankful to say with few of his usual warnings -- though I am not without hints of his near approach. 671
I enclose a memorandum of the sale of Middlemarch in 4 vols. -- I think there are indications that the sale of the complete work is entirely to private purchasers, in which case we may still have a good sale to come. We have sold also since publication about 850 of Book 8.
You will be surprised to hear that Harry Trollope 672 has gone on a visit to Australia. In writing to Trollope perhaps you will be kind enough not to allude to this 673 unless you hear it from someone else. Trollope will most likely and would unquestionably if you were with him tell you all about it but as he told me that besides myself he should talk about it only with Charles Taylor 674 and O'Neil 675 I do not feel at liberty to enter into the matter. It will be attributed no doubt to a business quarrel but the cause is one which has troubled our sex from the earliest periods and the young man has shown himself amenable to reason and obedient to parental authority. Trollope has behaved with his usual promptness. It must trouble him though and he is involved in a quarrel with Charles Reade about dramatising Ralph the Heir -- that is C. R. quarrels but Trollope will not. 676 I am sorry for I have always stood up for Reade but in this case he was wrong from the beginning and has at last written a very bad letter headed "Mr. Trollope," getting himself more into the mud at every step he has taken.
With compliments to Mrs. Blackwood I am, My dear Sir,
Yours respectfully
J. M. Langford.
John Blackwood Esq.
MS: National Library of Scotland. Hitherto unpublished.
Paternoster Row | December 24th 1872.
My dear Sir,
Once more on the eve of another Christmas I write to wish you the compliments of the season and a long continuance of prosperity and of happiness to yourself, Mrs. Blackwood, and the young people. With myself I cannot help feeling that old age is approaching but I am thankful to say with few of his usual warnings -- though I am not without hints of his near approach. 671
I enclose a memorandum of the sale of Middlemarch in 4 vols. -- I think there are indications that the sale of the complete work is entirely to private purchasers, in which case we may still have a good sale to come. We have sold also since publication about 850 of Book 8.
You will be surprised to hear that Harry Trollope 672 has gone on a visit to Australia. In writing to Trollope perhaps you will be kind enough not to allude to this 673 unless you hear it from someone else. Trollope will most likely and would unquestionably if you were with him tell you all about it but as he told me that besides myself he should talk about it only with Charles Taylor 674 and O'Neil 675 I do not feel at liberty to enter into the matter. It will be attributed no doubt to a business quarrel but the cause is one which has troubled our sex from the earliest periods and the young man has shown himself amenable to reason and obedient to parental authority. Trollope has behaved with his usual promptness. It must trouble him though and he is involved in a quarrel with Charles Reade about dramatising Ralph the Heir -- that is C. R. quarrels but Trollope will not. 676 I am sorry for I have always stood up for Reade but in this case he was wrong from the beginning and has at last written a very bad letter headed "Mr. Trollope," getting himself more into the mud at every step he has taken.
With compliments to Mrs. Blackwood I am, My dear Sir,
Yours respectfully
J. M. Langford.
John Blackwood Esq.
Signature
J. M. Langford.
Citation
Joseph Munt Langford, Joseph Munt Langford to John Blackwood, London, 24 December 1872, Complete George Eliot Letters(2026), George Eliot Archive, edited by Beverley Park Rilett. https://GeorgeEliotArchive.org, Accessed September 7, 2026. https://www.georgeeliotarchive.org/items/show/95519