of war. On one occasion Smith was able to answer the challenge of a scoffer who thought to name an exceptional article of commerce—a human skeleton—which it would be beyond his power to supply, by displaying in his office two or three waiting to be packed for transit.
Smith's absorption in the intricate details of the firm's general operations prevented him from paying close attention to the minutiæ of the publishing department; but the fascination that it exerted on him never slept, and he wisely brought into the office one who was well qualified to give him literary counsel, and could be trusted to keep the department faithful to the best traditions of English publishing. His choice fell on William Smith Williams, who for nearly thirty years acted as his 'reader' or literary adviser. The circumstances under which he invited Williams's co-operation illustrate the accuracy with which he measured men and their qualifications. At the time the two met, Williams was clerk to Hullmandel & Walter, a firm of lithographers who were working for Smith, Elder, & Co. on Darwin's 'The Voyage of H.M.S. Beagle.' On assuming the control of the Cornhill business Smith examined with Williams the somewhat complicated accounts of that undertaking. After very brief intercourse he perceived that Williams was an incompetent bookkeeper, but had exceptional literary knowledge and judgment. No time was lost in inducing Williams to enter the service of Smith, Elder, & Co., and the arrangement proved highly beneficial and congenial to both.[1] But Smith delegated to none the master's responsibility in any branch
- ↑ William Smith Williams (1800-1875) played a useful part behind the scenes of the theatre of nineteenth-century literature. He was by nature too modest to gain any wide recognition. He began active life in 1817 as apprentice to the publishing firm of Taylor & Hessey of Fleet Street, who published writings of Charles Lamb, Coleridge, and Keats, and became in 1821 proprietors of the 'London Magazine.' Williams cherished from boyhood a genuine love of literature, and received much kindly notice from eminent writers associated with Taylor & Hessey. Besides Keats, he came to know Leigh Hunt and William Hazlitt. Marrying at twenty-five he opened a bookshop on his own account in a court near the Poultry, but insufficient capital compelled him to relinquish this venture in 1827, when he entered the counting-house of the lithographic printers, Hullmandel & Walter, where Smith met him. At that time he was devoting his leisure to articles on literary or theatrical topics for the 'Spectator,' 'Athenæum,' and other weekly papers. During the thirty years that he spent in Smith's employ he won, by his sympathetic criticism and kindly courtesy, the cordial regard of many distinguished authors whose works Smith, Elder, & Co. published. The paternal consideration that he showed to Charlotte Brontë is well known; it is fully described in Mrs. Gaskell's 'Life' of Miss Brontë. 'He was my first favourable critic,' wrote Charlotte Brontë in December 1847; 'he first gave me encouragement to persevere as an author. When she first saw him at Cornhill in 1848, she described him as 'a pale, mild, stooping man of fifty.' Subsequently she thought him too much given to 'contemplative theorising,' and possessed by 'too many abstractions.' With Thackeray, Ruskin, and Lewes he was always on very friendly terms. During his association with Smith he did no independent literary work beyond helping to prepare for the firm, in 1861, a 'Selection from the Writings of John Ruskin.' He was from youth a warm admirer of Ruskin, sharing especially his enthusiasm for Turner. Williams retired from Smith, Elder, & Co.'s business in February 1875, and died six months later, aged 75, at his residence at Twickenham (21 Aug.) His eldest daughter was the wife of Mr. Lowes Dickinson, the well-known portrait painter; and his youngest daughter, Miss Anna Williams, achieved distinction as a singer.
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