He was bound to the
firm for twenty years, and during that time he produced his greatest
works. It is true that but for the difficulties in which he was latterly
immersed, we might never have known the noble courage with which he met
and rose superior to misfortune.
In 1808 a scheme of great magnitude was under contemplation by Murray
and the Ballantynes. It was a uniform edition of the "British
Novelists," beginning with De Foe, and ending with the novelists at the
close of last century; with biographical prefaces and illustrative notes
by Walter Scott. A list of the novels, written in the hand of John
Murray, includes thirty-six British, besides eighteen foreign authors.
The collection could not have been completed in less than two hundred
volumes. The scheme, if it did not originate with Walter Scott, had at
least his cordial support.
Mr. Murray not unreasonably feared the cost of carrying such an
undertaking to completion. It could not have amounted to less than
twenty thousand pounds. Yet the Ballantynes urged him on. They furnished
statements of the cost of printing and paper for each volume.
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