"There were in fact, in the first edition, not eight volumes but seven. "I take the liberty to join the 4 Vols. you have of _Clarissa_, by two more," says Richardson to Hill in an unpublished letter of November 7, 1748. "The Whole will make Seven; that is, one more to attend these two. Eight crowded into Seven by a smaller Type. Ashamed as I am of the Prolixity, I thought I owed the Public Eight Vols. in Quantity for the Price of Seven"; and he adds a later footnote to explain that the 12mo book "was at first published in Seven Vols. [and] Afterwards by deferred Restorations made Eight as now."" Then Mr. Dobson goes on to add the following: "Of the seven volumes constituting the first edition, two were issued in November, 1747; two more in April, 1748 (making "the 4 Vols. you have," above referred to); and the remaining three, which, according to Mr. Urban's advertisement, "compleats the whole," in December, 1748." The second and succeeding volumes have the line, _And Sold by John Osborn, in Pater-noſter-Row_, added to the imprint, after Richardson's name. Bishop Warburton presented the author with a preface in which he pointed out the variety of the characters in the book, and commended the moral tendency of the work. This, by the way, serves to remind us that he afterward quarrelled with Richardson because the novelist ventured to censure Pope's sentiment, "Every woman is at heart a rake." In a catalogue like this, no name has more interest than that of Samuel Richardson, "The Father of the English Novel," and a printer and publisher of distinction. At the age of seventeen he chose the profession of printer, because he thought that in it he would be able to satisfy his craving for reading. After a diligent apprenticeship to John Wilde, whose daughter was his first wife, he gradually won his way until he became one of the leading printers of his time. He issued twenty-six volumes of _Journals_ of the House of Commons, though he found the position more honorable than lucrative; he was the printer of the _Daily Journal_ from 1736 to 1737, and of the _Daily Gazetteer_ in 1738; he was chosen printer to an interesting _Society for the Encouragement of Learning_, for whom he printed and edited their first and only volume, _The Negociations of Sir Thomas Roe in his Embassy to the Ottoman Porte from the year 1621 to 1628 inclusive_. He also printed, among other books, an edition of _Æsop's Fables_, De Foe's _Tour through Great Britain_, Young's _Night Thoughts_, and the second volume of De Thou's _Historia Sui Temporis_, 1733. He became a member of the Stationers' Company in 1689, and its master in 1754. Duodecimo. COLLATION: _Seven volumes._ HENRY FIELDING (1707-1754)