"The Philadelphiad" (1784) gives us a glimpse of the motley society that loitered in Bell's Third Street shop.
"Just by St. Paul's, where dry divines rehearse, _Bell_ keeps his store for vending prose and verse, And books that's neither--for no age nor clime, Lame, languid prose, begot on hobb'ling ryme. Here authors meet who ne'er a sprig have got, The poet, player, doctor, wit and sot; Smart politicians wrangling here are seen Condemning Jeffries or indulging spleen, Reproving Congress or amending laws, Still fond to find out blemishes and flaws; Here harmless _sentimental-mongers_ join To praise some author or his wit refine, Or treat the mental appetite with lore From Plato's, Pope's, and Shakespeare's endless store; Young blushing writers, eager for the bays, Try here the merit of their new-born lays, Seek for a patron, follow fleeting fame, And beg the slut may raise their hidden name."
The Philadelphia magazines, from Franklin's to Graham's, furnished ample opportunities for "young blushing writers eager for the bays." Their articles, it is true, were often a kind of yeasty collection of fond and winnowed opinions, but among these shallow fopperies there would at times be heard a strain of higher mood. Nor is the story of these magazines altogether without its pathos. American writers, after the Revolution which lost England her colonies, felt themselves to be under the opprobrium of the literary world. They felt keenly the sneers of English men-of-letters, and winced under injustice and invective that they were not strong enough to resent. The insolence of British travellers was especially provoking. J. N. Williams, a Philadelphian, stung by some offensive criticism by a wandering Englishman, wrote, "America looked not for a spy upon the sanctity of her household gods in the stranger that sat within her gates; she scarce supposed that the hand of a clumsy servant like the claws of the harpies could utterly mar and defile the feast which honest hospitality had provided."
The _Port Folio_, in 1810, was moved indignantly to declare that foreign critics grounded their strictures "upon the tales of some miserable reptiles who, after having abused the hospitality and patience of this country, levy a tax from their own by disseminating a vile mass of falsehood and nonsense under the denomination of Travels through the United States."