Reply to a pamphlet recently circulated by Mr. Edward Brooks

Preface

I feel that some apology is due to my friends and to the public for adopting, on matters of a strictly private nature, the present form of appeal. No one more thoroughly disapproves of such a mode of adjusting individual grievances.

But the course taken by Mr. Brooks seems to leave me no alternative. For, however much disposed I might be, were my own feelings alone concerned, to leave his attack unanswered, the surviving relatives of Mr. Boott, who look to me for a vindication of his character, — the public, who have reposed confidence in my faithful administration of important interests, — and, I may be allowed to add, the honor of a name which has descended to me untarnished, — alike require, that charges of so grave a character should at once be met and refuted.

The necessary line of my defence has obliged me, with the

sanction of the persons to whom they were addressed, to make

free use of the letters of Mr. William Boott. This requires no

apology, — as the printing, by his permission, of the testimony

he would have given before the Supreme Court in impeachment

of the memory of his brother, and also of extracts from private

letters addressed to him by Dr. Boott and Mr. Wells, makes

him as much a party to the publication I have answered, as if

his name had been emblazoned with that of Mr. Edward Brooks

on its title-page.

J. A. L.

Boston, February 16, 184S