I shall be glad to hear from you as often as you have any thing new to communicate, and how the preparations go on. Every thing now is in the hands of government, but, strange to tell, I have not yet heard from the Herald's Office, whether I am to attend the procession or not.

Believe me,

Your much obliged humble servant,

NELSON.

The codicil referred to in these letters proved to be, or at least to include, that memorable document which the Earl suppressed, when he produced the will, lest it should curtail his own share of the amount of favour which a grateful country would be anxious to heap on the representative of the departed hero. By this unworthy conduct the fortunes of Lady Hamilton and her still surviving daughter were at once blighted.

The Earl as tightly held all he had, as he grasped all he could get. It was expected that he would resign his stall at Canterbury in favour of his brother's faithful chaplain and when he "held on" notwithstanding his peerage and riches, he was attacked in the newspapers. The following letter is the last communication with which Dr. Scott was honoured, for his work was done:—

Canterbury, May 28, 1806.

Sir,—I am glad to find, by your letter, that you are not concerned in the illiberal and unfounded paragraphs which have appeared and daily are appearing in the public prints.

I am, Sir, your very humble servant,

NELSON.

The Rev. Dr. Scott.

The above have never been printed, and I shall be glad if they are thought worthy of a place in your very useful and interesting periodical. I am, Sir, &c.,

ALFRED GATTY.

Ecclesfield, 7th Nov. 1849.

MISQUOTATIONS

Mr. Editor,—The offence of misquoting the poets is become so general, that I would suggest to publishers the advantage of printing more copious indexes than those which are now offered to the public. For the want of these, the newspapers sometimes make strange blunders. The Times, for instance, has lately, more than once, given the following version of a well-known couplet:—

"Vice is a monster of so frightful mien, As to be hated needs but to be seen."

The reader's memory will no doubt instantly substitute such hideous for "so frightful," and that for "as."

The same paper, a short time since, made sad work with Moore, thus:—

"You may break, you may ruin the vase if you will, But the scent of the roses will hang by it still."

Moore says nothing about the scents hanging by the vase. "Hanging" is an odious term, and destroys the sentiment altogether. What Moore really does say is this:—

"You may break, you may ruin the vase if you will, But the scent of the roses will cling round it still."

Now the couplet appears in its original beauty.

It is impossible to speak of the poets without thinking of Shakspeare, who towers above them all. We have yet to discover an editor capable of doing him full justice. Some of Johnson's notes are very amusing, and those of recent editors occasionally provoke a smile. If once a blunder has been made it is persisted in. Take, for instance, a glaring one in the 2nd part of Henry IV., where, in the apostrophe to sleep, "clouds" is substituted for "shrouds."

"Wilt thou, upon the high and giddy mast, Seal up the ship-boy's eyes, and rock his brains In cradle of the rude imperious surge, And in the visitation of the winds, Who take the ruffian billows by the top, Curling their monstrous heads, and hanging them With deafening clamours in the slippery clouds, That with the hurly death itself awakes?"

That shrouds is the correct word is so obvious, that it is surprising any man of common understanding should dispute it. Yet we find the following note in Knight's pictorial edition:—

"Clouds.—Some editors have proposed to read shrouds. A line in Julius Cæsar makes Shakspere's meaning clear:—

"'I have seen Th' ambitious ocean swell, and rage, and foam, To be exalted with the threatening clouds.'"

Clouds in this instance is perfectly consistent; but here the scene is altogether different. We have no ship-boy sleeping on the giddy mast, in the midst of the shrouds, or ropes, rendered slippery by the perpetual dashing of the waves against them during the storm.

If in Shakspeare's time the printer's rule of "following copy" had been as rigidly observed as in our day, errors would have been avoided, for Shakspeare's MS. was sufficiently clear. In the preface to the folio edition of 1623, it is stated that "his mind and hand went together; and what he thought he uttered with that easinesse that wee have scarse received from him a blot in his papers."

D***N**R.

8th Nov. 1849.

HERBERT AND DIBDIN'S AMES

BORDE'S BOKE OF KNOWLEDGE—BOWLAND'S CHOISE OF CHANGE—GREENE'S ROYAL EXCHANGE

Mr. Editor,—I am induced to mention the following misstatement in Herbert's edition of Ames' Typographical Antiquities, enlarged by Dibdin, not by its importance, but by its supplying an appropriate specimen of the benefits which would be conferred on bibliography by your correspondents complying with Dr. Maitland's recommendations.

"Mr. Bindley," says Dibdin, "is in possession of the original impression of Borde's Boke of the Introduction of Knowledge, which was successively in the collection of West and Pearson. This copy, and another in the Chetham Library at Manchester, are the only ones known with the following imprint: 'Copland in Fletestrete, at the signe of the Rose Garland.' In the Selden Collection, in the Bodleian Library, and in the copy from which Mr. Upcott published his reprint, we read on the recto of the last leaf, 'Imprented at London in Lothbury ouer agaynste Sainct Margaryte's Church, by me Wyllyam Copland.'"

The copy in the Chetham Library, now lying before me, corresponds with the description of the latter impression. Dibdin's mistake perhaps originated in the last page of the work preceding Borde, which is bound up with four other works, having the following: "Imprinted at London in Fleetestrete by Henry Wykes."

This volume contains—

"The Choise of Change: Containing the Triplicitie of Diuinitie, Philosophie, and Poetrie, Short for memorie, Profitable for Knowledge, and necessary for Maners; whereby the learned may be confirmed, the ignorant instructed, and all men generally recreated. Newly set forth by S.R., Gent and Student in the Universitie of Cambridge. Tria sunt omnia. At London, Printed by Roger Warde, dwelling neere Holborne Conduite, at the sign of the Talbot, An. Dom. 1585."

These letters, S.R., are the well known initials of Samuel Rowlands, who appears to have been a Welshman, from his love of Triads, and from the dedications found in this the rarest of his works, and those described by Mr. Collier in his Catalogue of the Bridgewater House Collection. In the same volume is comprised a tract by Greene, with a copy of which Mr. Dyce could never meet, entitled The Royal Exchange, printed in 1590.

T. JONES.

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