II
THE BOOK
Of the twenty-four books and plays here enumerated, "Charlotte Temple" alone has survived. But what a survival that has been! Its early success in England merely foreshadowed the success it was destined to have in America, with scarcely an interruption down to the present day — a period of one hundred and fifteen years. As a survival among books of that generation it is probably matched in this country only by Franklin's "Autobiography," if indeed that book has matched it. Among novels it had no rival in its own day-not even "Evelina" or "The Children of the Abby." None of Scott's novels, which came a generation later, could have had so wide a reading here. Not until "Uncle Tom's Cabin" appeared
Perhaps even now, in the number of copies actually printed and read, "Charlotte Temple" has not been exceeded by Mrs. Stowe's work, because, being not protected by copyright, it has been constantly issued by many publishers in the cheapest possible forms of paper as well as cloth. The editions are innumerable. I has been published in London, New York, Philadelphia, Boston, and several of the smaller American towns, including Ithaca N. Y., Windsor, Vt., and Concord, N. H. Some of the early editions were in two volumes, but all later reprints seem to have been in one, tho some have appeared in the form of two volumes bound as one. Several have had a frontispiece, some vignette, and a few have had illustration in the text, but recent editions have commonly had no illustrations save now an then a frontispiece. In size the edition have been 18mos, 16mos, 12mos, and
Duyckinck, writing in 1855, said the story was still "a popular classic at the cheap bookstalls and with traveling chapmen."[3] Reprints of it to this day are offered in department stores, on sidewalk bookstalls, and by pushcart dealers. In the little stationery stores of tenement districts it can usually be found on shelves where are kept some hundreds of secondhand or shop-worn paper covered novels. The shopkeeper will probably say he keeps "Charlotte Temple" constantly in stock, and that it is one of his best-selling books. A collector in New York many years ago had secured a large shelfful of various editions, said to number about one hundred. Mr. Nason did not exaggerate the actual facts when he offered up the following tribute to the popularity of this book:
In the best modern editions the integrity of the text has been better preserve perhaps than the circumstances, carefully considered, would have led one to expect but, as already stated, the text to-day is
Once errors had crept into the text, it can be understood how they were almost inevitably repeated at the next setting of the type. With each resetting further errors would be made, so that an edition now current might show accumulations from three, or possibly four, generations of compositors. So formidable a total of errors (1265, large and small, by actual count) gives further evidence of the extraordinary popularity of Mrs. Rowson's little book.
In one edition among those I have seen, systematic condensation of the text has occurred, and other condensed editions are known to have been published The one referred to was issued in Philadelphia in 1865, with the author's name omitted from the title-page. At least one-fourth of the matter has been eliminated, some of the chapters have be entirely rewritten, and their number reduced from thirty-five to twenty-eight. The publishers announced on the title-page that this was "the only correct a authentic edition" of the book; declared in an introduction, that it was "the on correct one ever issued," and that it has been "printed from a copy of the original publication," which of course was impossible.
It was a thin, paper-covered octave with illustrations showing styles of dress worn in 1865—that is, ninety years later than the period of the story. Besides these sensational woodcuts in the text,
it pretended to have a likeness of Charlotte, "taken from an original portrait," but looking like a fashion-plate, Charlotte being arrayed in an evening dress supported by a hoopskirt.. This stupid misrepresentation of Charlotte is reproduced elsewhere in the present volume, with the sensational cover-title which the portrait was supposed to adorn. As an appendix, an article on the tombstone in Trinity churchyard was printed with an outline of "Lucy Temple." It was written by John Barnitz Bacon.[4] Owing to these pictorial and editorial features, newly introduced, the, publishers were able to copyright this edition.
Other liberties, much more reprehensible, have been taken with the book. In the slums of large cities, many years ago, perverted editions were common, the text having been altered in a way to secure
By means of these publications, now forgotten, Charlotte's character became much perverted in the minds of ill-informed people, among whom doubtless were persons of respectability and intelligence. Something of that influence has survived to this day in the impressions
which many retain of the real character of Charlotte Temple.
The text of the rare first American edition, which appeared in Philadelphia while Mrs. Rowson was living there, has been carefully followed in this reprint. A copy was obligingly lent for the purpose by its owner, Mabel Osgood Wright. The original owner, as shown by an autograph on the title-page of the first volume, was Susanna Rodgers, the inscription being dated September 25, 1794. Except for the stains of time and twenty-one pages which in the bottom margin have been invaded by a bookworm, the copy is perfect. The two volumes are bound as one in half morocco, the number of pages for the two volumes being 87 and 83 respectively.