The 1849 Best Seller

36Bulletin of Friends Historical Association the Scottish poet and American ornithologist, and the tenth in that series was delivered by 'F. H. Underwood, Esq., LL.D., U. S. Consul and Hon. Member of the Society.' His subject was 'The New England Awakening.' Underwood played his part in awakening more people in the British Isles to the works of American authors, not least among them Whittier. His recommendations , to a people whose history was so often a stem record of man's fight for freedom, were obvious. THE 1849 BEST SELLER By C. Marshall Taylor* ?G?? Autumn 1948 number of the Bulletin (p. 96) refers to the fact, as developed by Frank Luther Mott in his Golden Multitudes (New York, Macmillan, 1947), that Poems by John G. Whittier was the best seller of that decade; which meant that more than 175,000 copies were sold. Why? There was no Book-of-the-Month Club or Literary Guild to extol its virtues. It must have had merit and appeal all of its own. B. B. Mussey of Boston was sympathetic to the anti-slavery movement and undoubtedly published this volume as a tribute to Whittier and his outstanding contributions to the "cause." It was a collection of poems which, with one exception, had already been published elsewhere or in previous Whittier books —Poems (1838), Lays of My Home (1843), Voices of Freedom (1846), and the London Ballads of 1844. It included several poems of particular interest to Friends—"Barclay of Ury," "The Quaker of the Olden Time," "My Soul and I," "Chalkley Hall," "The Reformer," "Worship," "To -------, with a copy of Woolman's Journal," and "Daniel Wheeler." This latter poem, though first published in The Friend (Phila.) August 1, 1840, had been included in the London Ballads by Whittier's direction, because "it would be pleasant perhaps to our English friends." There was also a curious poem, long since forgotten, called "The Pumpkin" but it had to do, much more appropriately , with pie, not papers! * C. Marshall Taylor, a member of the Board of Directors of Friends Historical Association, has written a number of articles on Whittier. Notes and Documents37 This was the first comprehensive edition of Whittier's poems. Pickard records that this volume "met with an unexpectedly large sale, and Mr. Mussey earned the gratitude of Mr. Whittier by paying him more than he had agreed"—five hundred dollars for the copyrights, and also a percentage on sales.1 It ran into several editions and had by all odds the most decorated binding, cloth or leather, ever used on Whittier's books. The portrait used did not altogether meet with Whittier's approval for he wrote "in the main, a poor picture." 2 In 1888 it was reengraved, with not much improvement, and used in Vol. 2 of the Riverside Edition. 1 Life and Letters of John Greenleaf Whittier (Boston and New York, 1894), I, 347. 2 Roberts Collection, Haverford College Library. ...