sufficiently natural; that journals which have a poverty of original matter, should have recourse to that which can be obtained not only gratuitously, but by an extraordinary convention, without loss of reputation, and without even the necessity of a translation, need be no mystery; but the readiness with which the practice can be accounted for, will not, I think, prove its justification, if it can be shown that it is destructive of those sentiments of self-respect, and of that manliness and independence of thought, that are necessary to render a people great, or a nation respectable. Questions have now arisen between a portion of the press and myself, which give me more authority to speak in the matter than might belong to one whose name had not been so freely used, and it is my intention, while I endeavor to do myself justice, to make an effort to arrest the custom to which there is allusion; and which, should it continue to prevail, must.der every. American more or less subject to the views of those who are hostile to the prosperity, the character, and the power of his native land.

I am fully aware that every man must prepare himself to meet the narrowest constructions on his motives, when he assumes an office like this I have here undertaken; but I shall not complain, provided the opinion of the public receive a healthful impulse; while, at the same time, I shall not neglect the proper means to support my argument, by showing, as far as circumstances will permit, that I come to the discussion with clean hands. These constructions might have been obviated by having recourse to an anonymous publication, or by engaging some friendly pen to speak for me; but I have preferred the simpler, and, as I think, more manly course, of appearing in my own behalf. The nature of the proof I propose to offer, will compel me to mention myself oftener than I could wish, were not evidence of this nature less liable to be questioned, than that which comes from sources more indirect. I shall not

shrink from my intention, therefore, on this account, while there is a hope that good may come of it. In vindicating myself, it will be necessary to reply to many attacks, without always quoting the papers in which they have appeared, which would swell this letter to an unreasonable size, and that, too, on a part of the subject that I could wish to treat as briefly as possible; but the reader is assured, that nothing of a direct personal nature will be said, that has not its warranty in some obvious allusion, insinuation, or open charge, in some one of the many journals of this country. In three instances, (those of the New-York American, the New-York Courier & Enquirer, and the New-York Commercial Advertiser,) it is my intention to answer the statements separately; distinctly marking the points at issue between each journal and myself, as is due to all the parties concerned.

I shall now proceed to execute the purpose of this letter, as briefly as the circumstances will allow, again begging the reader to remember that every statement which relates especially to myself, is either in reply to some unequivocal allegation to the contrary that is to be found in the public prints, or has a direct reference to the practice which it is so desirable to destroy.

First, then, I will show, that I come to this discussion with clean hands. At no period of my life have I had any connection with any review, notice or critique of any sort, that has appeared for or against me as a writer. With a single, and a very immaterial exception, I do not know to this hour, who are the authors of any favorable notice, biography, or other commentary, that has appeared on myself, or on any thing I have published; and in the case of the exception, I was made acquainted with the name of the writer, after the notice was written.. As respects Europe, so far from having used any undue means to procure reviews, criticisms, or puffs, I am ignorant of the names of the writers of every thing of this sort that

has appeared which has been in my favor; have proba bly not even read a dozen of these notices, with the exception of such as were to be found in the daily prints, since I have been absent; have refused numerous applications from the editors of periodicals, to send them critiques and copies of the books I had written; and, whenever it could be done, without obvious impropriety, have uniformly declined making the acquaintance of those who were known to be connected with what are called critical publications. In several instances, the very reviews which have made direct applications to me for favorable notices, have turned against me when it was understood that the request would not be complied with.* In short, I affirm, that every report or asseveration that any review has been written in Europe, or any where else, by my connivance, or even with my knowledge, to produce an impression on the public mind at home, or with any other view, is founded in error or in malice. For a short time, I was a voluntary contributor of a periodical, that was edited by an old messmate, (Col. Gardner, the present Deputy Postmaster-General,) and I think he will remember the fact, that, when he declared his intention to obtain a favorable notice of "The Pioneers," I objected to it, on the ground of its being painful to me to see critiques of this kind in a publication with which I was connected, and that my objection prevailed.

I have been repeatedly and coarsely accused of writing for money, and exaggerated accounts of my receipts have been paraded before the public with views that it is not easy to mistake. That I have taken the just compensation of my labors, like other men, is true; nor do I see that he

I am just informed by a friend, that he was lately applied to, by the editor of a literary journal in this city, to write a favorable notice of "The Headsman;" that he declined; and that an unfavorable one soon after appeared in the same publication!

who passes a year in the preparation of a work, is not just as much entitled to the fruits of his industry, as he who throws off his crude opinions to-day, with the strong probability that on the morrow circumstances will compel him to admit that he was mistaken. Of this accusation, it is not my intention to say much, for I feel it is conceding a sacred private right to say any thing; but as it has been frequently pressed into notice by my enemies, I will add, that I never asked nor received a dollar for any thing I have written, except for the tales and the letters on America; that I have always refused to sacrifice a principle to gain, though often urgently entreated to respect the prejudices of foreign nations, with this very view; and that all the reports of the sums I have been soliciting and obtaining in France, Germany, and other countries, are either wholly untrue, or extravagant and absurd exaggerations.

I have been accused of undue meddling with the affairs of other nations. On this head it will be necessary to answer more at length, as the accusation takes two forms; one which charges me with entering impertinently into a controversy with the French government, and the other resting on the political tendency of some of the tales.

As respects the first, I shall say but little here, for I hope to be able to give the history of that controversy in a form less perishable than this letter.

In 1828, after a residence of two years in Europe, and when there had been sufficient opportunity to observe the disfavor with which the American character is viewed by nearly all classes of Europeans, I published a work on this country, whose object was to repel some of the hostile opinions of the other hemisphere, and to turn the tables on those who, at that time, most derided and calumniated us. This work was necessarily statistical in some of its features. In 1831, or about a year after the late revolution in France, there appeared at Paris, in a publication called

La Revue Britannique, (the British Review, and this in France, be it remembered!) an article on the United States, which affected to prove that the cost of government in this country was greater than it was in France, or indeed in nearly every other country; and that a republic, in the nature of things, must be a more expensive form of government than a monarchy. This article, as has been stated, appeared in a review with a foreign title, at a moment when the French government professed great liberality, and just after the King of the French (taking the papers for authority) had spoken of the government of the United States as "the model government." There was no visible reason for believing that the French ministry had any connection with the review, and, although the fact might be and was suspected, the public had a perfect right, under all the laws of courtesy and usage, to assume exactly the contrary. In short, this dissertation of the Revue Britannique appeared, like any other similar dissertation, to be purely editorial, and it was clearly within the usual privileges of an author, whose positions it denied, as it denied those advanced in the work of mine just mentioned, to justify what he had already said. In addition to this peculiar privilege, I had that, in common with every citizen of the country whose facts were audaciously mutilated and perverted,. of setting the world right in the affair, if I saw proper. Such a course was not forbidden by either the laws of France, any apparent connection between the review and the government, or the "reserve usually imposed on foreigners." I could cite fifty cases in which the natives of countries attacked have practised this right, from Baretti down to a countryman of our own, who has just exercised it in England. I did not exercise it. The article was pointed out to me; I was told that it was injuring the cause of free institutions; that it was depriving America of nearly the only merit Europe had hitherto conceded to her; and