strikes me," said James Ballantyne, "the more I think of and examine it,
to be the happiest speculation that has ever been thought of."

This undertaking eventually fell through. Only the works of De Foe were
printed by the Messrs. Ballantyne, and published by Mr. Murray. The
attention of the latter became absorbed by a subject of much greater
importance to him--the establishment of the _Quarterly Review_. This for
a time threw most of his other schemes into the shade.




CHAPTER V

ORIGIN OF THE "QUARTERLY REVIEW"


The publication of a Tory Review was not the result of a sudden
inspiration. The scheme had long been pondered over. Mr. Canning had
impressed upon Mr. Pitt the importance of securing the newspaper press,
then almost entirely Whiggish or Revolutionary, on the side of his
administration. To combat, in some measure, the democratic principles
then in full swing, Mr. Canning, with others, started, in November 1797,
the _Anti-Jacobin, or Weekly Examiner_.

The _Anti-Jacobin_ ceased to be published in 1798, when Canning, having
been appointed Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, found his
time fully occupied by the business of his department, as well as by his
parliamentary duties, and could no longer take part in that clever
publication.