It is altogether probable that Hogg’s frank avowal dismayed the men who had studied to keep its authorship secret for so many years, fearing lest the confession implicate his colleagues. At any rate, such vehement protestations as the above are to be eyed askance in the light of saner evidences. “Maga” was prone to go off on excursions of this kind; and William Blackwood had at last realized his dreamed-of Sensation! No doubt he knew the risk he took in publishing the Chaldee; but in the tumult which followed, he stood equal to every occasion. Hogg was not then in Edinburgh, and Wilson and Lockhart too thought it wise to leave town. The letters of the two latter to Blackwood during the days of the libel suits remind one of the tragic notes of boys of twelve a la penny dreadful! But Blackwood was firm and undisturbed through it all, disclaiming all responsibility himself, never disclosing a single name. The secret was safe and the success of “Maga” sure. In the November number, however, he saw fit to insert such statements as the following: “The Publisher is aware that every effort has been used to represent the admission into his Magazine of an article entitled “A Translation of a Chaldee Manuscript” as an offence worthy of being visited with a punishment that would involve in it his ruin as a Bookseller and Publisher. He is confident, however, that his conduct will not be thought by the Public to merit such a punishment, and to them he accordingly appeals.”[78]--And again, on a page by itself in the same November number appears the following statement: “The Editor has learned with regret that an Article in the First Edition of last Number, which was intended merely as a _jeu d’esprit_, has been construed so as to give offence to Individuals justly entitled to respect and regard; he has on that account withdrawn it in the Second Edition, and can only add, that if what has happened could have been anticipated, the Article in question certainly never would have appeared.”[79] [78] Ibid., V. ii, p. 1 of the introductory pages [79] Ibid., V. ii, p. 129