This must have been a rather rash speculation on the publisher's part, as there had been several editions of Swift's works published.

The first appeared in twelve volumes in 1755, edited by Hawkesworth.

Deane Swift, Hawkesworth, and others, added thirteen more volumes in the course of the next twenty-five years, and when the whole was completed it was reissued in three different sizes.

In 1785 an edition in seventeen volumes was published, edited by Thomas Sheridan.

In 1801 the edition by Nichols was published, and it reappeared in 1804 and in 1808.