for by the valuable and interesting matter in the body of the number."
This was le dernier mot of the venerable Messenger, for though no hint was given of its discontinuance, no further number of it is now known. But there is a fact which is very little known, that in January, 1864, Wm. M. Burwell and Ernest Legarde, editors, started in Richmond, The Age, a Southern Eclectic Magazine, monthly. Still, some of its contents were original. It was, of course, a competitor of the Messenger, but treated it cordially. It offered to supply the disappointed subscribers to The Record, which had failed. In January, 1865, it managed, "after an extended suspension" of three-fourths of a year, to get out its fifth number and promised more, but we have never seen them. The price of this No. 5 was five dollars. The price of the Messenger was raised to five dollars a year; then to eight dollars, next to ten dollars, finally to fifteen dollars a year.
Richmond had now no monthly literary periodical. Farewell to thee, dear old Messenger, thou patriarch and Nestor of American monthly magazine literature. Requiescas in honore. So far as is known to this warm friend, only one red-snapper, "scalawag" critic has wished thee an earlier demise.
The Messenger is spoken of designedly as the
