Gauss

‘Gauss knew all the works of Sir Walter Scott very thoroughly and he passionately admired them.  The tragic ending in “Kenilworth” made a painful impression on him and he would have preferred not to read it.  He read Scott’s “Life of Napoleon” with great interest and felt quite satisfied, being in full agreement with the author.  One day he found a passage in Scott which set him to laughing.  It was just too much for an astronomer.  Gauss compared all the editions he could get his hands on to make sure it was not a misprint.  The words were: “The moon rises broad in the northwest”. ..’

We know Carl Gauss more as a mathematician than an astronomer.  Any student of statistics is familiar with his work.  Gauss was apparently very sensitive to sad stories, as the passage from Dunnington, Gray and Dohse’s “Carl Friedrich Gauss: Titan of Science” indicates.  Carl Gauss was born on April 30^th, 1777.

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Blackwood Signs

On April 30, 1816, William Blackwood signed a contract with James Ballantyne, Scott's publisher, to print up to 6,000 copies of what became "The Black Dwarf".  Publisher John Murray worked with Blackwood in the London market.

The relationship between Blackwood and Murray began a few years earlier, when Murray visited Edinburgh, in the fall of 1814.  The development of their relationship is recounted in Samuel Smiles' "A Publisher and his Friends...":

'Among the friends that welcomed Mr. Murray to Edinburgh was Mr. William Blackwood, who then, and for a long time after, was closely connected with him in his business transactions. Blackwood was a native of Bradfute, booksellers, he was selected by Mundell & Company to take charge of a branch of their extensive publishing business in Glasgow. Hereturned to Edinburgh, and again entered the service of Bell et Bradfute; but after a time went to London to master the secrets of the old book trade under the well-known Mr. Cuthill. Returning to Edinburgh, he set up for himself in 1804, at the age of twenty-eight, at a shop in South Bridge Street--confining himself, for the most part, to old books. He was a man of great energy and decision of character, and his early education enabled him to conduct his correspondence with a remarkable degree of precision and accuracy. Mr. Murray seems to have done business with him as far back as June 1807, and was in the habit of calling upon Blackwood, who was about his own age, whenever he visited Edinburgh. The two became intimate, and corresponded frequently; and at last, when Murray withdrew from the Ballantynes, in August 1810 he transferred the whole of his Scottish agency to the house of William Blackwood. In return for the publishing business sent to him from London, Blackwood made Murray his agent for any new works published by him in Edinburgh. In this way Murray became the London publisher for Hogg's new poems, and Edinburgh; having served his apprenticeship with Messrs. Bell & "The Queen's Wake," which had reached its fourth edition.'

Journal Critique from Scott

April 30 (1829).—Dr. Johnson enjoins Bozzy to leave out of his diary all notices of the weather as insignificant. It may be so to an inhabitant of Bolt Court, in Fleet Street, who need care little whether it rains or snows, except the shilling which it may cost him for a Jarvie; but when I wake and find a snow shower sweeping along, and destroying hundreds perhaps of young lambs, and famishing their mothers, I must consider it as worth noting. For my own poor share, I am as indifferent as any Grub Streeter of them all—



"—And since 'tis a bad day,
Rise up, rise up, my merry men,
And use it as you may."
 
From Scott's Journal.
 
Walter Scott seemed to think of Samuel Johnson often in his journal writings, mentioning him more than a dozen times.  In January 1829, Scott wrote a letter to John Wilson Croker to provide material for Croker's edition of Boswell's "Life of Johnson".
 
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