It was a project ever present to the mind of my late uncle and partner, John Blackwood, with whom I had the pleasure and great advantage of working in the closest intimacy for over twenty years, to use the abundant records of the firm for some permanent chronicle of the earlier portion of its history. He entertained the conviction that it behoved him to pay to the memory of his father and elder brothers the tribute of putting on record the not uneventful annals of the publishing house and the ‘Magazine’ which William Blackwood founded, together with some account of the brilliant band of authors and contributors whom his energy and his very genuine love of literature succeeded in rallying to his support. And in addition to this natural motive, it was further my uncle's belief, and one which, as his successor, I am fain to share, that the history of ‘Maga’ and its contributors would contain much that was of literary value as illustrating a strangely interesting period of our literature, and in especial as furnishing some important side-lights on the progress of the periodical press. Unfortunately it was not given to the projector of this scheme to live to witness its commencement. My uncle died after materially adding to the history of the firm without having had time to superintend the chronicling of its past.