A Note on the Third Printing of Longfellow's Miles Standis..

BAL leaves unresolved what constitutes the Third Printing of Longfellow's The
Courtship of Miles Standish, first published on October 1, 1858 by Ticknor and
Fields of Boston.

I now have two early copies of the work and may be able to lend some help.

The first printing (which I still seek) bears the year M DCCC LVIII on the title
page. It also has the following points of issue:
Page 119, last line: "Cry of pain on crags Caucasian"
Page 124, line 3: "The revel of the treacherous wine"
12 pages of advertisements at the end of the book
[not mentioned explicitly by BAL].

The Second printing bears the date M DCCC LIX on the title page, has the same
line on Page 119, but "ruddy" for "treacherous" on page 124, and 12 pages of
advertisements.

The Fourth printing has the 1859 date and "Born of Heavenward aspiration" on p.
119, "ruddy" on page 124, and 16 pages of advertisements.

The question has always been whether the Third printing is like the Second or
the Fourth.

One of the copies I have conforms to the description of the second printing and
the other to the description of the fourth printing, but the latter copy also
has written on the title page the name of the owner (Eleanor G. Ewing) and the
date "Nov[ember] 27, [18]58".

Looking at the publication notes in BAL, I think we can make some progress:

First Printing
August, 1858 - Paper for 5280 copies sent to printer.
Actual printing date unknown
August 19, HWL sent letter directing "treacherous" be changed to "ruddy"
Sept. 7 - publisher ordered 12 page catalog for insertion
[Date of binding unknown]
October 1st - Announcement in BM as "just appeared"

Second Printing
Sept. 25 - Paper for 5000 copies sent to printer
Oct. 2 - Printed
Oct. 19 - Copy of 2nd printing presented to HWL

Third Printing
Oct. 16 - Publisher orders printing of 16 page catalog
Oct. 15 - 20 - 10,000 copies printed
Nov. 1 - the Twentieth Thousand is advertised in BM

Fourth Printing
Oct. 20 - Paper for 5,000 sent to printer
Nov. 8 - printed

The 16 page catalog was ordered in time for the Third Printing, but not the
second. So the Second would have the 12 page catalog.

It will also be noted that in the various printings there were about 20 - 23
days [first printing], 17 days [second printing], 10 - 15 days (third printing)
between the printing date and availability for sale. The average is about 15 -
18 days. So, on the Fourth printing, that printing would be available for sale
somewhere around November 23 - 26, though conceivably as early as November 18th.
In all probability, Third printings were still being sold toward the end of
November. So the probabilities are strong that the copy on which Eleanor G.
Ewing wrote her name and Nov. 27 ' 58 was a third printing, especially if she
lived outside of Boston. (There was a 33 year old Eleanor Ewing in Philadelphia
at the time.) Thus, the Third printing probably looked the same as the Fourth
printing, not the Second printing. The evidence is not conclusive, but it does
increase the likelihood.


Francis A. Miniter