The albatross was the _Library of American Literature_, edited by Stedman and
someone else whose name I have forgotten.  The original publisher, and the man
who owned the copyright for the first six volumes of the series, was a man
named Dibble.  After Webster bought the series from Dibble, he hired the
Cincinnati publisher as an aide.  Webster and CSLC were locked in their final
battle at this time, and Webster wanted to shore up his defenses at the firm by
 hiring a number of people on whose loyalty he could count.  The series was
actually prospectively profitable, but Webster contructed a payment scheme for
it such that production would absorb massive amounts of capital before the long
 term profits would appear.  The firm could have sold the series to a better
capitalized publisher, except that they offered it for sale just when the panic
 of 1893 dried up capital and made every investor left leery of accepting any
expensive debt.  Fred Hall, Webster's successor, borrowed money to buty the
remaining copyrights from Dibble, in order to be able to sell the whole series
outright, and that is what began the wretched decline of Webster & Co.
                                           Andy Hoffman