wished to edit Shakespeare. In 1838 appeared the first number of the ‘Pictorial Shakespere.’ Knight's edition has doubtless been superseded at many points. His faith in the first folio may possibly have been too unflinching; but H. N. Coleridge was not far wrong when he called it ‘the first in the country conceived in a right spirit,’ and no future editor can afford to neglect it. The ‘Pictorial Shakespere’ was completed in 1841. Before the last part appeared Knight had begun to publish ‘a series of original treatises by various authors’ under the name of ‘Knight's Store of Knowledge for all Readers,’ leading off himself with two numbers devoted to Shakespeare. The ‘library edition’ began to appear in January 1842, and during 1842 and 1843 Knight went to Stratford, Oxford, Edinburgh, Glasgow, in search of materials for the ‘Biography,’ upon which he was now at work. In the spring of 1844 appeared the twenty-seventh and last volume of the ‘Penny Cyclopedia,’ and the event was celebrated by a dinner, at which Knight was ‘entertained’ by his friends, Brougham being in the chair. The ‘Weekly Volumes,’ a series started largely owing to a suggestion of Harriet Martineau, were begun at this time. The first appeared on 29 June, the publisher opening with a biography of William Caxton. In this series (appearing every week for two years, and every month for two years more in the ‘shilling volume’) many well-known works made their first appearance: Miss Martineau's ‘Tales,’ G. H. Lewes's ‘Biographical History of Philosophy,’ Mrs. Jameson's ‘Early Italian Painters,’ Rennie's ‘Insect Architecture,’ ‘The Camp of Refuge,’ and many more. The ‘Penny Magazine’ was now drawing to an end, and with it Knight's connection with the Useful Knowledge Society. He made a short effort to continue the magazine in his own name; but this series only lived six months. Three months before this, in March 1846, the society itself had come to an end. Hitherto Knight had taken the risk of the various works brought out under its auspices, the society receiving a ‘rent,’ practically a royalty, in return for the prestige of its name. The ‘Biographical Dictionary,’ which it undertook at its own expense, failed after devoting seven excellent volumes to the letter A, when the loss was nearly 5,000l., and the society prudently wound up.
Knight gradually withdrew from miscellaneous publishing, though his pen was as active as ever. The ‘Weekly Volumes’ only paid their way, but he had for some time been carrying on with better success a series of ‘picture-books, especially adapted for sale by book-hawkers,’ called ‘The Pictorial World,’ illustrative of natural history, English topography, &c. In 1847 he began his ‘Half-hours with the Best Authors,’ and ‘The Land we Live in,’ containing pictures and descriptions of everything noteworthy in England. To obtain materials he travelled all over the country. In 1848 he started a weekly periodical, ‘The Voice of the People,’ to which Miss Martineau contributed; but it failed after a career of three weeks on account, she says, of the dictatorial interference of whig officials (Harriet Martineau, Autobiography, ii. 298). In 1846 he had begun to publish in parts ‘A History of the Thirty Years' Peace, 1815–1845.’ After sixteen chapters had been written Miss Martineau took it up, completed it in 1849, and in the following year wrote an introduction, taking the history back to the opening of the century. This, published in 1851, would seem to be the last work of general literature bearing Knight's imprint. Since that time with the exception of one or two reprints of his works, only official or semi-official publications have been issued by the house, which in his later years had migrated to Fleet Street. His own books were in future published chiefly by Bradbury & Evans; a few by Murray.
In 1851 Knight was invited by Dickens to take a part in Bulwer's comedy, ‘Not so bad as we seem,’ in connection with the ‘Guild of Literature and Art.’ He had already been connected with Dickens's amateur companies; but this seems to have been the first time that he was cast for a part. He played Jacob Tonson in the performance at Devonshire House.
In 1855 he was a juror at the Paris exhibition. In the same year, on the repeal of the stamp duty (to which his exertions had largely contributed), he started a ‘Town and Country Newspaper.’ The method (which failed at the time, though it has since been adopted) was to print general news in London, leaving a space blank for local news, to be supplied in the places to which the paper was sent. The ‘English Cyclopedia’ (1853–1861) was practically only the old ‘Penny Cyclopedia’ revised and brought up to date. Knight now set about the ‘Popular History of England.’ The plan of this was ‘to trace through our annals the essential connection between our political history and our social,’ to enable the people ‘to learn their own history—how they have grown out of slavery, out of feudal wrong, out of regal despotism—into constitutional liberty, and the position of the greatest estate of the realm.’ The history, in eight volumes, was completed by the end of 1862. In 1865 appeared an
