Letter from Elizabeth Hamilton to H[enry?] M[ackenzie?], Esq.
24 Nov 1801.
I hope you have before this received from Messrs. Bell and Bradfute a copy of the Memoirs which Mr. R[obinson] desired them to send you. A third edition is now printing, [20/21] the second having been disposed of in less than two months. If money is the substance, and honour the shadow, R. will be the greatest gainer by my labours; but, as I have had all I asked from him, I have no reason to complain. Whatever I demanded for my new work [Letters on Education], he would have complied with; and, on this account, my friends abuse me for having made a foolish bargain. It only, however, extends to the first volume. If that sells well, I shall know how to bargain for the second; though, I confess, I would rather write the whole book than higgle about the price. I might justly be accused of affectation, did I not confess that I have been highly gratified by the success of the Memoirs. An acquaintance with the celebrated characters to which they have been the means of introducing me, I should, in the fond hours of sanguine hope, have considered as the ne plus ultra of felicity.
Source: Elizabeth Benger, Memoirs of the Late Mrs Elizabeth Hamilton. With a Selection from her Correspondence, and Other Unpublished Writings, 2 vols (London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme and Brown, 1818), II, 20–21.
Notes: Letter is addressed from 11 Russell Street, London. The firm of G. G. & J. Robinson published both Memoirs of Modern Philosophers and Letters on Education (1801–02).