with page 9200, but 295 pages are inserted in various places,
and page 7099 is followed by 8000. The number and length
of the articles were much increased, 72 have cross headings, and
more than 150 others may be classed as long articles. At the
end is an appendix (“Abatement” to “Wood”) of 200 pages,
containing, under the heading Botanical Table, a list of the 931
genera included in the 58 natural orders of Linnaeus, and followed
by a list of 526 books, said to have been the principal authorities
used. All the maps are placed together under the article
“Geography” (195 pages). Most of the long articles have
numbered marginal titles; “Scotland,” 84 pages, has 837.
“Medicine,” 309 pages, and “Pharmacy” have each an index.
The plan of the work was enlarged by the addition of history
and biography, which encyclopaedias in general had long omitted.
“From the time of the second edition of this work, every cyclopaedia
of note, in England and elsewhere, has been a cyclopaedia,
not solely of arts and sciences, but of the whole wide circle
of general learning and miscellaneous information” (Quarterly
Review, cxiii. 362). Smellie was applied to by Bell to edit the
second edition, and to take a share of one-third in the work;
but he refused, because the other persons concerned in it, at the
suggestion of “a very distinguished nobleman of very high
rank” (said by Professor Napier to have been the duke of
Buccleuch), insisted upon the introduction of a system of general
biography which he considered inconsistent with the character
of a dictionary of arts and sciences. James Tytler, M.A., seems
to have been selected as the next most eligible compiler. His
father, a man of extensive knowledge, was 53 years minister of
Fearn in Forfarshire, and died in 1785. Tytler (outlawed by
the High Court of Justiciary, 7th of January 1793, buried
at Salem in Massachusetts on the 11th of January 1804, aged
fifty-eight) “wrote,” says Watt, “many of the scientific treatises
and histories, and almost all the minor articles” (Bibliotheca
Brit.).
After about a year’s preparation, the third edition was announced in 1787; the first number was published early in 1788, and the first volume in October 1788. There were to be 300 weekly numbers, price 1s. each, forming 30 parts at 10s. 6d. each, and 15 volumes, with 360 plates. It was completed in 1797 in 18 vols. 4to, containing 14,579 pages and 542 plates. Among the multifarious articles represented in the frontispiece, which was required by the traditional fashion of the period, is a balloon. The maps are, as in subsequent editions, distributed among the articles relating to the respective countries. It was edited by Colin Macfarquhar as far as the article “Mysteries” (by Dr Doig, vol. xii.), when he died, on the 2nd of April 1793, in his forty-eighth year, “worn out,” says Constable, “by fatigue and anxiety of mind.” His children’s trustees and Andrew Bell requested George Gleig of Stirling (consecrated on the 30th of October 1808 assistant and successor to the bishop of Brechin), who had written about twelve articles, to edit the rest of the work; “and for the time, and the limited sum allowed him for the reward of contributors, his part in the work was considered very well done” (Constable, ii. 312). Professor Robison was induced by Gleig to become a contributor. He first revised the article “Optics,” and then wrote a series of articles on natural philosophy, which attracted great attention and were long highly esteemed by scientific men. The sub-editors were James Walker (Primus Scotiae Episcopus 27th of May 1837, died on the 5th of March 1841, aged seventy) until 1795, then James Thomson, succeeded in November 1796 by his brother Thomas, afterwards professor of chemistry at Glasgow, who remained connected with the Encyclopaedia until 1800. According to Kerr (Smellie’s Life, i. 364-365), 10,000 copies were printed, and the profit to the proprietors was £42,000, besides the payments for their respective work in the conduct of the publication as tradesmen,—Bell as engraver of all the plates, and Macfarquhar as sole printer. According to Constable (Memoirs, ii. 312), the impression was begun at 5000 copies, and concluded with a sale of 13,000. James Hunter, “an active bookseller of no character,” who had a shop in Middle Row, Holborn, sold the book to the trade, and on his failure Thomson Bonar, a wine merchant, who had married Bell’s daughter, became the seller of the book. He quarrelled with his father-in-law, who would not see him for ten years before his death in 1809. When the edition was completed, the copyright and remaining books were sold in order to wind up the concern, and “the whole was purchased by Bell, who gave £13 a copy, sold all the complete copies to the trade, printed up the odd volumes, and thus kept the work in the market for several years” (Constable, ii. 312)
The supplement of the third edition, printed for Thomson Bonar, and edited by Gleig, was published in 1801 in 2 vols. 4to, containing 1624 pages and 50 copperplates engraved by D. Lizars. In the dedication to the king, dated Stirling, 10th December 1800, Dr Gleig says: “The French Encyclopédie had been accused, and justly accused, of having disseminated far and wide the seeds of anarchy and atheism. If the Encyclopaedia Britannica shall in any degree counteract the tendency of that pestiferous work, even these two volumes will not be wholly unworthy of your Majesty’s attention.” Professor Robison added 19 articles to the series he had begun when the third edition was so far advanced. Professor Playfair assisted in “Mathematics.” Dr Thomas Thomson wrote “Chemistry,” “Mineralogy” and other articles, in which the use of symbols was for the first time introduced into chemistry; and these articles formed the first outline of his System of Chemistry, published at Edinburgh in 1802, 8vo, 4 vols.; the sixth edition, 1821.
The fourth edition, printed for Andrew Bell, was begun in 1800 or 1801, and finished in 1810 in 20 vols. 4to, containing 16,033 pages, with 581 plates engraved by Bell. The dedication to the king, signed Andrew Bell, is dated Lauristoun, Edinburgh, 1809. The preface is that of the third edition with the necessary alterations and additions in the latter part. No articles were reprinted from the supplement, as Bell had not the copyright. Professor Wallace’s articles on mathematics were much valued, and raised the scientific character of the work. Dr Thomas Thomson declined the editorship, and recommended Dr James Millar, afterwards editor of the Encyclopaedia Edinensis (died on the 13th of July 1827). He was fond of natural history and a good chemist, but, according to Constable, slow and dilatory and not well qualified. Andrew Bell died on the 10th of June 1809, aged eighty-three, “leaving,” says Constable, “two sets of trustees, one literary to make the money, the other legal to lay it out after it was made.” The edition began with 1250 copies and concluded at 4000, of which two-thirds passed through the hands of Constable’s firm. Early in 1804 Andrew Bell had offered Constable and his partner Hunter the copyright of the work, printing materials, &c., and all that was then printed of the fourth edition, for £20,000. This offer was in agitation in March 1804, when the two partners were in London. On the 5th of May 1804, after Lord Jeffrey’s arrival in Edinburgh, as he relates to Francis Horner, they entrusted him with a design, on which he found that most of his friends had embarked with great eagerness, “for publishing an entire new encyclopaedia upon an improved plan. Stewart, I understand, is to lend his name, and to write the preliminary discourse, besides other articles. Playfair is to superintend the mathematical department, and Robison the natural philosophy. Thomas Thomson is extremely zealous in the cause. W. Scott has embraced it with great affection. . . . The authors are to be paid at least as well as reviewers, and are to retain the copyright of their articles for separate publication if they think proper” (Cockburn, Life of Lord Jeffrey, 1852, ii. 90). It was then, perhaps, that Constable gave £100 to Bonar for the copyright of the supplement.
The fifth edition was begun immediately after the fourth as a mere reprint. “The management of the edition, or rather mismanagement, went on under the lawyer trustees for several years, and at last the whole property was again brought to the market by public sale. There were about 1800 copies printed of the five first volumes, which formed one lot, the copyright formed another lot, and so on. The whole was purchased by myself and in my name for between £13,000 and £14,000, and it was said by the wise
