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Preface Introduction
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INTRODUCTION
INTRODUCTION. *
OOKS--like boots, boilers, banjos and binocular glasses--are made to sell. Sometimes the purchaser is sold as well as the book; for instance, anyone buying "Ruffs Guide to the Turf" under the idea that he was obtaining a useful work for a gardener, would probably find himself in that predicament. Sometimes the author is sold when the book does not sell--but more often the publisher ; and--contradictorily--when the book does sell, nobody is sold.
    This book is therefore no exception to the general rule. It is made to sell, and the author sincerely hopes that it will fulfil its mission. He can lay his hand upon his heart with the proud satisfaction of knowing that it is NOT written with a moral purpose. He does not imagine that it will make anyone wiser or better than he or she was before reading it. Such, in fact, is not his intention. There are plenty of excellent people in the world far more capable of improving mankind than he is. Even if he could improve his fellow man, he very much doubts if he would, for fear of his motives being misconstrued. People who improve other people are generally unpleasant themselves, and somebody is sure to want to disestablish them, or go to their funerals, or get rid of them in some permanent and satisfactory manner. So improvement is not, by any means, the author's object. No--his motives are higher, nobler! motives which appeal to feelings all possess, from the penniless, pauper in the workhouse ward, to the diamonded duke in his palatial castle. Need the author further mention that his motives are three in number, and that they are £ S. D.
    But to the book itself. On that subject the author feels himself thoroughly competent to speak. He has written it, and nobody knows as much about it as he does. Far be it from him unduly to laud a work with which he has, so to say, been intimately connected since its commencement ; far be it from him immoderately to lavish upon it that praise, which he feels it ought to obtain from a discriminating public : his natural modesty revolts from such a course, and sooner than be guilty of it, he would prefer the book to be given away free, gratis, together with a ticket for admission to the stalls of any theatre in London, a £5 note, and a barrel of Anglo-Portugo oysters direct from the beds. But the author's preference, alas ! goes for nothing. The stony-hearted publisher here steps in and declares that such an arrangement would, in the first place, be derogatory to his honour as a publisher ; in the second place, it would be a bad, not to say immoral, example ; in the third place, it would lead people astray, and in the fourth place, it would not be remunerative to him: and finally, he'll see the author privately executed in Newgate, or any where else--where a good working gallows, to carry one, can be erected--first.
    This, of course, at once puts an end to those philanthropic intentions for the good of his fellow men which the author had originally in view; and that being the case, there is only one line of conduct he can advise the readers of this introduction to pursue.
    It is this. Having obtained possession of the book, whatever you do, don't lend it. Not even to the wife of your bosom, the mother of your early years, the father of your riper manhood (or womanhood as the case may be,) or the child of your affection. Lend it to none of them. Tell them it is a great, grand, and glorious work, which Shakespeare, Byron, Milton, Dickens, Thackeray, Lytton, Gladstone, Disraeli, or any one else you may happen to think of at the moment, would have been proud to have written, and then urge them, as they value their welfare upon earth, to go and BUY it. BUY IT! that is the great point. What they do with it after they have bought it, is a matter of not the slightest consequence, and one with which you have really no concern. So long as they buy it, and recommend their friends to do the same, the author will be pleased, the publisher satisfied, and general happiness pervade the atmosphere.
    Finally, the author is of opinion, and he enunciates this opinion with all possible diffidence, that although bigger, heavier, and, to a certain extent, more important books have been written, yet he has never, in the whole course of his life, come across one which so forcibly appealed to the grander feelings of the human heart; one which was so admirably calculated to strengthen the weak, cheer the despondent, cure dyspepsia, calm the troubled mind, produce a fine crop of luxuriant hair on the baldest headed, or instil principles of true goodness into the most depraved, as--
YE COMIC HISTORY OF HERALDRY.
* THE PRINTER TO THE AUTHOR.
    DEARSIR,
    Yours of the 4th, received ; likewise your Introduction to the " Heraldry," but I am without your instructions as to where in the book you wish it to go. Some persons in your line of business place introductions, and prefaces, and such like fills-up at the commencement of the volume, others again at the end ; but if you take my advice, a man who has been since the age of 13 years and 4 months in the printing profession, I should say--the middle. You see, sir, it's this way. Scarcely anybody wants an introduction, and nobody reads it--if they can do anything else. If it is at the beginning they say, and rightly, "Oh, we'll skip this," and they skip it accordingly with a unanimity that would be touching if it wasn't otherwise. If the Introduction is at the end, and the readers fancy the book, when they've done with it, they say, "I wonder what the Introduction is about--dry rot as usual, I suppose, " and then perhaps they read it, or perhaps they don't, which is the most likely, and you, as the author, stand just half a chance of having your Introduction read. Personally, I am quite impartial in the matter, as I never read Introductions or books either--having in the course of my profession known too many of the people who wrote them. Now what I propose, sir, is, that you put the Introduction in, say about the 9th Chapter, and right in the middle, so that when a reader comes across it, he'll read it and think it's part of the text, or that the binders have got drunk, and put a bit of somebody else's book into yours by mistake, and then he'll go into fits of laughter on the strength of what a sharp party he or she (for it's quite likely to be a woman) is, to find it out.
    Consequently, sir, I think the middle is the best place in which to put the Introduction; and, if you have no objection, that is where it shall go.
Yours faithfully,
THE PRINTER.
THE AUTHOR TO THE PRINTER.
    SIR,
    I am in the receipt of your letter, and can only say no one but a dunderheaded dolt or a drivelling idiot would ever even dream of placing an introduction anywhere but at the commencement of a volume. Therefore, if you have no objection, that is where I should wish it to go. Uneducated mechanics arc scarcely the proper persons to judge where introductions, far above their comprehensions, are best fitted to be placed. Please proceed with the business of printing the book, and refrain from obtruding your remarks and opinions on subjects upon which, from your position, you are utterly unable to form an opinion.
Yours obediently,
THE AUTHOR.
THE PRINTER TO THE AUTHOR.
    DEAR SIR.
    Yours received. If I might suggest to you one thing, it is this--Don't lose your temperI "Who knows what might happen? Somebody might find it who had one of his own, or who did not want yours, and it might lead to no end of confusion, which I am sure you as the father of a family and a ratepayer would regret.
    As regards the dunder-headed dolt or drivelling idiot you mention, I never knew but one of that sort, and he was in the same line of business as yourself a literary person who did the fires and fatal accidents for a high-class journal of society, and always drew his salary in advance. Likewise he was known and not trusted at all the houses where the flowing bowl circulated, both in Fleet Street and the Strand (N,B.-His flowing bowl was usually Gin neat) and he was the only dunder-headed dolt I ever knew.
    I think the Introduction had better go in the middle, as I said before.
Yours truly,
THE PRINTER
THE AUTHOR TO THE PRINTER.
    SIR,
    The Introduction had better NOT go in the middle, or if it does I'll know the reason why. Place it where Nature intended it to go, at the beginning of the work. As regards the literary person you knew, perhaps you are not aware that penny-a-liners are scarcely upon an equality with the writers of High-class works of science.
Yours obediently,
THE AUTHOR.
THE PRINTER TO THE AUTHOR.
    DEAR SIR,
    "Writers of high class works of science ! " You will excuse my laughing. But to our muttons. Gentlemen of my profession know more of the practical working of your line of business than you do who are in it. Depend upon it I know best. I am advising you for your good, and you'll live to bless me for it some day.
Yours faithfully,
THE PRINTER.
THE AUTHOR TO THE PRINTER.
    SIR,
    Do as I told you, and put the Introduction at the beginning of the book.
Yours obediently,
THE AUTHOR.
THE PRINTER TO THE AUTHOR.
    DEAR SIR,
    Now just look here. As I said before, it's for your good I'm advising you. If the Introduction is in the middle it's like the pill we put in jam for children, and it will then run a small chance of being read by accident and is bound to be swallowed ; whereas if it is at the beginning it won't be read at all. Not that that matters, so far as I can see, but I know that parties who write like to be read.
Yours truly,
THE PRINTER.
THE AUTHOR TO THE PRINTER.
    SIR,
    Please annoy me no more with frivolous objections, and ridiculous suggestions. Do as you are bid. In conclusion, if you still hold the same absurd ideas about the proper place where an introduction ought to go, I can only regard you as an unmitigated jackass.
Yours obediently,
THE AUTHOR.
THE PRINTER TO THE AUTHOR.
    DEAR SIR,
    I DO hold the same absurd ideas about where the Introduction ought to go, and therefore I am regarded by you as an "unmitigated jackass !"
    Sir,--you have insulted me. A legal friend of mine, a law writer (when sober) has promised to give me an opinion as to whether I can take the law of you. If I can, there shall be a slander case that will live for ages. Westminster Hall shall ring with my wrongs. Look out!
    I will put your Introduction, such as it is, at the beginning of your Heraldry, but in justice to myself, and a growing family of nine--the eldest of which, a boy who has not his equal at a joint on Sundays,--and the second, a girl who can sit upon her own back hair--I shall print this correspondence, with your Introduction (!), and then your readers, if you have any, can see who is right.
Yours faithfully,
THE PRINTER.

INTRODUCTION
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Preface Introduction
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