Miscellaneous.

NOTES ON BOOKS, ETC.

A Note on the coins of Edward III. by PROFESSOR VAN DER CHŸs, director of the cabinet of coins and medals in the University of Leyden, in a former part of this Number, reminds us to inform our readers that the Teyler's Society in Haarlem have just published the treatise on the coins of the ancient duchies of Brabant and Limberg from the earliest times to the pacification of Ghent, referred to by the professor, who has been several years occupied in making drawings and descriptions of coins in his own collection, in the cabinet under his care, and in other public and private collections in the Netherlands and neighbouring countries. His work, comprising more than 400 quarto pages of description and historical research, with 36 well-executed plates containing 470 specimens of coirs "from original drawings, supplies a want long felt, an I will be equally welcomed by the lover of coins and the student of history. It is not less remarkable for its cheapness than for its beauty.

Since the days when Teofilo Folengo, who has with some propriety been regarded as the forerunner of Rabelais, gave to the world, under the name of Merlinus Cocaius, the "Libriculum ludicrum et curiosum, partim latino, partim italiano sermone compositum," which may be said to have called into existence that burlesque style of composition which is now understood by the term Macaronic, not only has he found many imitators, but his and their works have always found a numerous class of purchasers at least, if not of readers. In 1829, Genthe gave to the literary world of Germany an excellent history of the works of this peculiar class. He was followed in this country in 1831 by Mr. Sandys, who then gave us his interesting Specimens of Macaronic Poetry; and we have now to thank M. Octave Delepierre for his Macaronéana, ou Mélanges de Littérature Macaronique des différents Peuples de l'Europe -an agreeable and amusing work upon the same subject. M. Delepierre, while busied in its preparation, has had the advantage of consulting the library of M. Van de Weyer, which appears to be as rich in this peculiar branch of bibliography, as it is known to be not only in every department of the literature of the Low Countries, but in everything that relates to the general history of literature.

When we consider the unwearied zeal and welldirected perseverance manifested by Mrs. Cowden Clarke in her admirable Concordance to Shakspeare, and the unvarying good taste and great ability with which she has shadowed forth the infant life of those female characters which Shakspeare has drawn with such mastery, we feel that we have scarcely done justice to The Girlhood of Shakspeare's Heroines in allowing this graceful and interesting series of Tales to I draw to the close, to which it has now been brought by the publication of Viola the Twin and Imogen the Peerless, without having directed the attention of our readers to the various tales, as they were from time to time presented to the world. The press has been unanimous in commending the plan proposed to herself by Mrs. Clarke, as well as her execution of it; and although at the eleventh hour, we join most heartily

in a commendation as well deserved as it has been universally bestowed.

If Authors have their peculiar calamities, they may console themselves by the reflection that Editors have also some which are peculiarly their own. Is it a small matter to receive a book (with a title which alone would occupy nearly a column) containing upwards of a thousand closely-printed pages, and be expected to give, in the short space which we can allot to such notes, an account of its objects, merits, &c.? And yet, when one reads in the opening of The Grammar of English Grammars, with an Introduction, Historical and Critical; the whole methodically arranged and amply illustrated, &c., by Goold Brown,-that it is the fulfilment of a design formed upwards of a quarter of a century since,-one feels pained at being merely enabled to announce that it is a work obviously the fruit of much reflection on the part of its author, and as obviously deserving of the attention of all whose duty it is to discover the most advantageous system of inculcating the rules of English Grammar.

We understand that several very important publications will shortly be issued from the Oxford University Press. We may first mention the Fasti Catholici, or Universal Chronology, by the Rev. Edward Greswell, author of the Harmony of the Gospels, the Parables, &c. It is stated that the present work, which contains the result of the indefatigable labour and research of the Editor for several years, is a still more learned and elaborate production than any of his previous publications. Another, which will excite great attention, is a Catalogue of the Manuscripts contained in the Libraries of the Twenty-four Colleges and Halls of the University of Oxford, which has been prepared by the Rev. Henry Octavius Coxe, one of the sub-librarians of the Bodleian Library, editor of Roger of Wendover's Chronicle, and of Lewis's Collection of Forms of Bidding Prayer, from the manuscript in the Bodleian Library. And, lastly, we may mention a reprint of Bishop Burnet's Lives of the Dukes of Hamilton, which is usually considered as a supplement to Spottiswoode's History of the Church of Scotland.

BOOKS AND ODD VOLUMES

WANTED TO PURCHASE.

ISR. CLAUDERI DISPUTATIO DE SALE SUB PRÆSIDIO SAGITTARI. Jenæ, 1650.

TILLOTSON'S SERMONS. Vol I. First Edition. 1670-80.
Edited by Parker, his Chaplain.

CRESCENT AND THE CROSs. Vol. I. Third Edition.
MACKINNON'S HISTORY OF CIVILISATION. Vol. II. 1846.
LITE'S DODOENS' HERBAL. First Edition. (An imperfect copy to
complete another.)

TURNER'S A BOOKE OF THE NATURES OF THE BATHES IN
ENGLAND. 1568. (An imperfect copy to complete another.)
A MOST EXCELLENT AND PERFECTE CORNISH APOTHECARY. 1561
(An imperfect copy to complete another.)
TURNER'S A NEW HERBALL. (An imperfect copy to complete
another.)

FIELDING'S WORKS. 14 Vols. Amelia].

1808. Vol. XI. [Being 2nd of

ENCYCLOPEDIA BRITANNICA. Vol. I. Third edition, published in 1794, Edinburgh, for A. Bell.

GIBBON'S DECLINE AND FALL. Vol. II. Dublin. Luke White. 1789.

ELSLEY ON THE Gospel and ACTS. London. 1833. Vol. I. SPENSER'S WORKS. Pickering's edition, 1839. Sm. 8vo. Vol. V. WHARTON'S ANGLIA SACRA. Fol. Vol. II.

ARISTOPHANES, Bekker. (5 Vols. edit.) Vol. II. London, 1829. LYDGATE'S BOKE OF TROYE 4to. 1555. (Any fragment.) COLERIDGE'S TABLE TALK. V 4. I. Murray. 1835.

THE BARBERS (a poem), by W. Hutton. 8vo. 1793. (Original edition, not the fac-simile.)

THE DOCTRINE AND PRACTICE OF THE CHURCH OF ROME TRULY REPRESENTED, by Edw. Stillingfleet, Bishop of Worcester, edited by William Cunningham, Min. Edinburgh.

A CATECHISM TRULY REPRESENTING THE DOCTRINES AND PRACTICES OF THE CHURCH OF ROME, with an Answer to them, by John Williams, M. A.

DODD'S CERTAMEN UTRIUSQUE ECCLESIÆ; or a List of all the Eminent Writers, Catholics and Protestants, since the Refor. mation. 1724.

THE SALE CATALOGUE of J. T. Brockett's Library of British and Foreign History, &c. 1823.

DODD'S APOLOGY FOR THE CHURCH HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 1742. 12mo.

SPECIMENS FOR AMENDMENTS FOR DODD'S CHURCH HISTORY, 1741. 12mo.

JOURNAL OF THE GEOLOGICAL SOCIETY OF DUBLIN. Vol. I. Part I. (Several Copies are wanting, and it is believed that many are lying in London or Dublin.)

CH. THILLON (DE HALLE) NOUVELLE COLLECTION DES APOCRYPHE3. Leipsic, 1832.

Letters, stating particulars and lowest price, carriage free, to be sent to MR. BELL, Publisher of NOTES AND QUERIES," 186. Fleet Street.

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I cannot look upon this emendation, although sanctioned by the two latest editors of Shakspeare, as by any means a happy one. The original word in the second quarto, ease," so nearly resembles "eale" in the first quarto (especially when printed with the old-fashioned long ""); and the subsequent transition from ease to base is so extremely obvious, and at the same time so thoroughly consistent with the sense, that it is difficult to imagine any plausible ground for the rejection of base in favour of ill. Dram was formerly used (as grain is at present) to signify an indefinitely small quantity; so that "the dram of base" presents as intelligible an expression as can be desired.

But in addition to its easy deduction from the original, base possesses other recommendations, in being the natural antagonist of noble in the line following, and in the capability of being understood either in a moral or physical sense.

If the whole passage be understood as merely assertive, then base may have, in common with ill, a moral signification; but if it be understood as a metaphorical allusion to substantial matter, in illustration of the moral reflections that have gone before, then base must be taken (which ill cannot) in the physical sense, as a base substance, and, as such, in still more direct antagonism to the noble substance opposed to it.

In a former paper I had occasion to notice the intimate knowledge possessed by Shakspeare in the arcana of the several arts; and I now recognise, in this passage, a metaphorical allusion to the degradation of gold by the admixture of baser metal. Gold and lead have always been in poetical opposition as types of the noble and the base;

and we are assured by metallurgists, that if lead be added to gold, even in the small proportion of one part in two thousand, the whole mass is rendered completely brittle.

The question then is, in what way "the dram of base" affects "all the noble substance ?" Shakspeare says it renders it doubtful or suspicious; his commentators make him say that it douts or extinguishes it altogether! And this they do without even the excuse of an originally imperfect word to exercise conjecture upon. The original word is doubt, the amended one dout; and yet the first has been rejected, and the latter adopted, in editions whose peculiar boast it is to have restored, in every practicable instance, the original text.

Now, in my opinion, Shakspeare did not intend doubt in this place, to be a verb at all, but a noun substantive and it is the more necessary that this point should be discussed, because the amended passage has already crept into our dictionaries as authority for the verb dout; thus giving to very questionable emendation the weight of an acknowledged text. (Vide Todd's Johnson.).

Any person who takes the amended passage, as quoted at the head of this article, and restores "dout," to its original spelling, will find that the chief hindrance to a perfect meaning consists in the restriction of doth to the value of a mere expletive. Let this restriction be removed, by conferring upon doth the value of an effective verb, and it will be seen that the difficulty no longer remains. The sense then becomes, "the base doth doubt to the noble," i. e. imparts doubt to it, or renders it doubtful. We say, a man's good actions do him credit; why not also, his bad ones do him doubt ? One phrase may be less familiar than the other, but they are in strict analogy as well with themselves as with the following example from the Twelfth Night, which is exactly in point:

·

Thou hast, Sebastian, done good feature shame." Hence, since the original word is capable of giving a clear and distinct meaning, there can be no possible excuse for displacing it, even if the word to be substituted were as faultless as it is certainly the reverse.

For not only is dout an apocryphal word, but it is inelegant when placed, as it must be in this instance, in connexion with the expletive doth, being at the same time in itself a verb compounded of do. Neither is the meaning it confers so clear and unobjectionable as to render it desirable; for in what way can a very small quantity be said to dout, or expel, a very large quantity? To justify such an expression, the entire identity of the larger must be extinguished, leaving no part of it to which the scandal mentioned in the third line could apply.

But an examination of the various places wherein scandal is mentioned by Shakspeare, shows that

the meaning attached by him to that word was false imputation, or loss of character: therefore, in the contact of the base and the noble, the scandal must apply to the noble substance -a consideration that must not be lost sight of in any attempt to arrive at the true meaning of the whole passage.

So far, I have assumed that "often" (the third substitution in the amended quotation) is the best representative that can be found for the "of a" of the original; and inasmuch as it is confirmed by general consent, and is moreover so redundant, in this place, that its absence or presence scarcely makes any difference in the sense, it is not easily assailable.

The best way, perhaps, to attempt to supplant it is to suggest a better word- one that shall still more closely resemble the original letters in sound and formation, and that shall, in addition, confer upon the sense not a redundant but an effective assistance. Such a word is offer: it is almost identical (in sound at least) with the original, and it materially assists in giving a much clearer application to the last line.

For these reasons, but especially for the last, I adopt offer, as a verb in the infinitive ruled by doth, in the sense of causing or compelling; a sense that must have been in familiar use in Shakspeare's time, or it would not have been introduced into the translation of Scripture.

In this view the meaning of the passage becomes, "The base doth the noble offer doubt, to his own scandal "—that is, causes the noble to excite suspicion, to the injury of its own character.

in

Examples of do in this sense are very numerous Spenser; of which one is (F. Q., iii. 2. 34.) : "To doe the frozen cold away to fly." And in Chaucer (Story of Ugolino): "That they for hunger wolden do him dien." And in Scripture (2 Cor. viii. 1.):

66

We do you to wit of the grace of God." By this reading a very perfect and intelligible meaning is obtained, and that too by the slightest deviation from the original yet proposed.

By throwing the action of offering doubt upon "the noble substance," it becomes the natural reference to "his own scandal" in the third line.

Hamlet is moralising upon the tendency of the "noblest virtues," "be they as pure as grace, as infinite as man may undergo," to take, from "the stamp of one defect," "corruption in the general censure" (a very close definition of scandal); and he illustrates it by the metaphor:

"The dram of base Doth all the noble substance offer doubt, To his own scandal."

Leeds.

A. E. B.