The Correspondence of the late John Wilkes, with his Friends, printed from the Original Manuscripts, in which are introduced Memoirs of his Life, by John Almon

London: Printed for Richard Phillips..., 1805. 5 volumes. 12mo, pp. xx, 271 [272 blank]; [iv], 235 [236 blank], iv, 300; [iv], 344; iv, 286 [287 - 288 adverts], engraved portrait of Wilkes as frontispiece in volume 1, engraved facsimile in volume 3, engraved folding facsimile at end of volume 4 and at end of volume 5, contemporary half calf, marbled boards; front cover volume one detached, spine volume 1 defective, joints on other volumes cracked and holding on for dear life. In 1804, Longman had published 4 volumes of Wilkes's letters to his daughter, with an anonymous memoir of his life. Both sets were reviewed in the January, 1805 (X, 477 - 489) issue of The Edinburgh Review: "Of the two performances now before us, it would not perhaps be very easy to say which is the most insignificant. If Mr Almon's contains somewhat more of serious discussion, and of political recollections, it is only, we are afraid, because he has borrowed more freely from former publications than his anonymous competitor, ho, if he be uniformly trifling, is at least entirely original, and is also considerably less voluminous that the editor of the authentic manuscripts." Writing to Charles O'Hara, Edmund Burke commented in 1773, that Wilkes "was as imprudent as his Enemies of all sorts could wish; But with his success, I do not know what part of his Conduct, after all, one can venture to call by the name of imprudence. It may perhaps be rather some unusual and eccentric kind of Wisdom."