To Flower o' the Thorn.

The blithe young year is upward steering;
Wild winter dwindles, disappearing:
The short, short days are growing longer;
Rough weather yields, and warmth is stronger.
Since January dawned, my mind
Waves hither, thither, love-inclined
For one whose will can loose or bind.
Prudent, and very fair the maiden;
Than rose or lily more love-laden;
Stately of stature, lithe and slender;
There's naught so exquisite and tender:
The Queen of France is not so dear;
Death to my life comes very near,
If Flower o' the thorn be not my cheer.
The Queen of Love my heart is killing
With her gold arrow pain-distilling;
The God of Love, with torches burning,
Lights pyre on pyre of ardent yearning:
She is the girl for whom I'd die;
I want none dearer far or nigh;
Though grief on grief upon me lie.

I with her love am thralled and taken,
Whose flower doth flower, bud, bloom, and waken;
Sweet were the labour, light the burden,
Could mouth kiss mouth for wage and guerdon!
No touch of lips my wound can still,
Unless two hearts grow one, one will,
One longing! Flower of flowers, farewell!

JOHN ADDINGTON SYMONDS. Note.-These songs are translated from the Carmina Burana. The originals are in Latin, of the

twelfth century.

inequalities of the territorial tax in Spain,
pointing out confusions and abuses rather than
suggesting remedies. Charro-Hidalgo y Diaz
gives a eulogistic review of José María de
Pereda, the best novelist of the Asturias and
of Northern Spain. Becerro de Bengoa de-
scribes, in an interesting paper, the subterra-
nean canal of Orbo, by which the waters of a
coal mine, once a danger and expense, have
been utilised, by the engineer Señor Zuaznavar,
for a canal upwards of a mile in length, which
conveys the coal to the nearest station, for the
traction of the boats, and for working the ven-
tilation-at a cost of only £10,000.

TENNYSON ON "THE PRINCESS."
MR. E. S. DAWSON, of Montreal, has brought
out a new edition of his study of "The Prin-
cess," prefaced by the following letter from the
Poet Laureate, which we reprint from the
Critic:-

"DEAR SIR,-I thank you for your able and thoughtful essay on 'The Princess.' You have seen, amongst other things, that if women ever were to play such freaks, the burlesque and the tragic might go hand-in-hand. I may tell you that the songs were not an after-thought. Before the first edition came out, I deliberated with myself whether I should put songs in between the separate divisions of the poem. Again, I thought, the poem will explain itself; but the public did not see that the child, as you say, was the heroine MAGAZINES AND REVIEWS. of the piece, and at last I conquered my laziness and inserted them. You would be still more certain Belgravia, noticeable from month to month that the child was the true heroine if, instead of for Mrs. Cashel Hoey's suggestive and interest- the first song as it now stands, As thro' the land ing novel "The Lover's Creed," is this month at eve we went,' I had printed the first song which doubly worth attention, for it contains an eight-sitting on the bank of a river, and playing with I wrote, "The losing of the child.' The child is page story of great power and pregnancyMiss Clementina Black's flowers-a flood comes down-a dam has been "Moonlight and Floods." broken thro' the child is borne down by the flood-the whole village distracted-after a time the flood has subsided-the child is thrown safe and sound again upon the bank, and all the women are in raptures. I quite forget the words of the ballad, but I think I may have it somewhere.

THE Deutsche Rundschau has some "Studies on Goethe," by Herr Wilhelm Scherer, which are all to the point and deal with definite problems concerning Goethe's writings. Herr von Sarburg begins an appreciative study of Alessandro Manzoni," and Herr Curtius gives a pretty sketch of "Athens and Eleusis."

IN the Revue historique M. de Grammont begins a series of "Etudes algériennes" which are likely to be of general interest. The first is a careful study of the rise and activity up to modern times of the Algerian Corsairs-a subject frequently alluded to, but little understood. M. R. Hammond publishes some documents bearing on the relations between France and Prussia from 1763 to 1769, the period of the re-establishment of diplomatic relations after

the Seven Years' War.

THE Theologisch Tijdschrift for May (a double number) gives a varied choice of subjects, ranging from Mr. Spencer's and Mr. Green's philosophy (Hugenholtz) to the genesis of the narratives respecting Aaron (Oort), the relation of John the Baptist and his disciples to Christianity (Hockstra), the Christology of the Epistle to the Hebrews (Mayboom), and the origin of the Eucharist (Bealage). The second and larger half of Green's Prolegomena to Ethics is considered to be a more vigorous defence of the author's standpoint than the first. With the reserve indicated, Dr. Hugenholtz ranks the book among the most valuable fruits of recent philosophic thought.

IN the Revista Contemporanea for April, Rodriguez Villa begins a valuable History of the campaign of the Archduke Leopold in Flanders in 1647; the present chapters carry the account down to the surrender of Armentières, May 30. Don Ramon L. de Vicuña treats of "The Subject of History," which is defined as "the relations of man to God, to nature, and to his fellows." Señor Barzanallana discusses the

"Your explanatory notes are very much to the
purpose, and I do not object to your finding
parallelisms. They must always recur. A man
(a Chinese scholar) some time ago wrote to me
saying that in an unknown, untranslated Chinese
poem, there were two whole lines of mine, almost
word for word. Why not? Are not human eyes
all over the world looking at the same objects, and
must there not consequently be coincidences of
thought and impressions and expressions? It is
scarcely possible for anyone to say or write any-
thing in this late time of the world to which, in
the rest of the literature of the world, a parallel
could not somewhere be found. But when you
say that this passage or that was suggested by
Wordsworth or Shelley or another, I demur, and
more, I wholly disagree. There was a period in
takes rough sketches of landskip, &c., in order to
my life when, as an artist, Turner for instance,
work them eventually into some great picture, so
I was in the habit of chronicling, in four or five
words or more, whatever might strike me as
picturesque in nature. I never put these down,
and many and many a line has gone away on the
north wind, but some remain-e.g.,

'A full sea glazed with muffled moonlight.'
Suggestion: The sea
when Torquay was the most lovely sea-village in
one night at Torquay,
England, tho' now a smoky town. The sky was
covered with thin vapour, and the moon was behind
it.

'A great black cloud

Drag inward from the deep.'
Suggestion: A coming storm seen from the top
of Snowdon. In the 'Idylls of the King':

'With all

Its stormy crests that smote against the skies.' Suggestion: A storm which came upon us in the middle of the North Sea.

'As the water-lily starts and slides.' Suggestion: Water-lilies in my own pond, seen

Suggestion: I was walking in the New Forest. A wind did arise and

'Shake the songs the whispers and the shrieks
The wind, I believe, was a west-wind, but, be-
Of the wild wood together.'
cause I wished the Prince to go south, I turned
the wind to the south, and, naturally, the wind
said 'follow.' I believe the resemblance which you
note is just a chance one. Shelley's lines are not
familiar to me, tho', of course, if they occur in
could multiply instances, but I will not bore you,
the Prometheus,' I must have read them. I
and far indeed am I from asserting that books, as
well as nature, are not, and ought not to be,
suggestive to the poet. I am sure that I myself,
and many others, find a peculiar charm in those
passages of such great masters as Virgil or Milton
where they adopt the creation of a bygone poet,
and reclothe it, more or less, according to their
own fancy. But there is, I fear, a prosaic set
growing up among us, editors of booklets, book-
worms, index-hunters, or men of great memories
and no imagination, who impute themselves to the
poet, and so believe that he, too, has no imagina-
tion, but is forever poking his nose between the
pages of some old volume in order to see what he
can appropriate. They will not allow one to say
Ring the bells,' without finding that we have
taken in from Sir P. Sydney-or even to use such
a simple expression as the ocean 'roars,' without
finding out the precise verse in Homer or Horace
from which we have plagiarised it. (Fact!)
two sons at sea, clench her fist at the advancing
"I have known an old fish-wife, who had lost
tide on a stormy day and cry out-Ay! roar, do!
how I hates to see thee show thy white teeth!"
Now if I had adopted her exclamation and put it
into the mouth of some old woman in one of my
poems, I dare say the critics would have thought it
original enough, but would most likely have
advised me to go to nature for my old women and
not to my own imagination, and indeed it is a strong
figure. Here is another little anecdote about
suggestion: When I was about twenty or twenty-
one I went on a tour to the Pyrenees. Lying
among these mountains before a waterfall that
comes down one thousand or twelve hundred feet,
I sketched it (according to my custom then) in
these words: Slow-dropping veils of thinnest
lawn. When I printed this a critic informed me
that lawn' was the material used in theatres to
imitate a waterfall, and graciously added, 'Mr. T.
should not go to the boards of a theatre but to
nature herself for his suggestions.' And I had
gone to nature herself. I think it is a moot point
whether, if I had known how that effect was pro-
duced on the stage, I should have ventured to
publish the line.

my custom, a letter, when I had merely intended
"I find that I have written, quite contrary to
to thank you for your interesting commentary.
Thanking you again for it, I beg you to believe me
very faithfully yours,
"A. TENNYSON.

66

Aldworth, Haslemere, Surrey, Nov. 21st, 1882. "PS.-By-the-by, you are wrong about the tremulous isles of light;' they are 'isles of light,' spots of sunshine coming through the leaves, and seeming to slide from one to the other, as the procession of girls 'moves under shade.' And surely the beard-blown' goat involves a sense of the ruined pillar." wind blowing the beard on the height of the

GUIZOT, M., Lettres de, à sa Famille et à ses Amis mythology, however, are not the same; and, if
recueillies par Mme de Witt. Paris: Hachette.
3 fr. 50 c.

MALOT, Hector. Marichette. Paris: Dentu. 6 fr.

MARIO, A., Scritti scelti e curati da Giosuè Carducci.
Vol. I. Bologna: Zanichelli. 5 L.
RAUNIE, E. Chansonnier historique du 18° Siècle.

T. 9. Paris: Quantin. 10 fr.
SAND, George, Correspondance de. T. V. Paris:
Calmann Lévy._ 3 fr. 50 c.
SOMMERVOGEL, C. Dictionnaire des Ouvrages anonymes
et pseudonymes publiés par des Religieux de la
Compagnie de Jésus depuis sa Fondation jusqu'à
nos Jours. Paris: Palmé. 30 fr.
TISSOT, Victor. La Police secrète prussienne. Paris:
Dentu. 3 fr. 50 c.

HISTORY, ETC.

CAVALLARI, S. e C., e A. HOLM. Topografia archeo-
logica di Siracusa. Palermo: Tip. dello Statuto.
80 L.
CIOTTI GRASSO, P. Del Diritto pubblico siciliano al
Tempo dei Normanni. Palermo: Tip. dello Statuto.
FENNER, H. Zwingli als Patriot u. Politiker. Frauen-

2 L. 50 c.

feld Huber. 1 M. 60 Pf. FLEISCHFRESSER, W. Die politische Stellung Ham

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1627-29. Hamburg: Jenichen. 1 M.
FUCHS, C. Geschichte d. Kaisers L. Septimius Severus.
Wien: Konegen. 3 M.
GILLES, J. Les Voies romaines et massiliennes dans
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Thorin. 7 fr. 50 c.
LALLEMEND, M., et A. BOINETTE. Jean Errard, de
Bar-le-Duc, premier Ingénieur du très chrestien

Thorin. 5 fr.

Roy de France et de Navarre Henry IV. Paris: SEINECKE, L. Geschichte d. Volkes Israel. 2. Thl. Vom Exil bis zur Zerstörg. Jerusalems durch die Römer. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck. 7 M. WERTHEIMER, E. Geschichte Oesterreichs u. Ungarns im ersten Jahrzehnt d. 19. Jahrh. Leipzig: Duncker

& Humblot. 8 M.

PHYSICAL SCIENCE AND PHILOSOPHY.

BOUILLIER, F. Etudes familières de Psychologie et de
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Queen's College, Oxford: May 17, 1881.

Sir George Cox's letter in the last number of the ACADEMY admits of an easy reply.

on

1. There is only one chapter, not "chapters,' Comparative Philology and the Science of Religion, not "Myths and Mythology," in my Introduction to the Science of Language. I cannot have plagiarised from Sir George Cox in this, as when the chapter was written I had not read a page of his book. If I have plagiarised from anyone, it is from myself, in my Principles of Comparative Philology, published eleven years ago. Sir George Cox's Mythology of the Aryan Nations remained known to me only by name until my Introduction was passing through the press and I was preparing a list of selected works for recommendation to the student. As I then found that it contained a good deal of what seemed to me to be questionable matter, I added a note of warning as regards the use of

it. On p. 570 of the new edition of his book

I

observe that Sir George Cox does not accuse me of copying from him-a charge, indeed, which he could not sustain but only of arriving at similar conclusions. Our theories of comparative

some of our conclusions are similar, it is because
we have drawn from common sources, more
especially Prof. Max Müller. But the incor-
rectness of his reference to my book makes
me doubt whether Sir George Cox has not
confounded my work with some other.
2. The statement that I have charged
Herodotos with making himself responsible for
the truth of the tale of the phoenix, whereas he
"distinctly disclaims all responsibility" for it,
has been borrowed by Sir George Cox (and
Prof. Jebb) from Mr. Verrall. Mr. Verrall,
however, never took the trouble to look at my
note on the passage, or even my previous refer-
ence to the fact on p. xxii. of the Introduction.
Had he done so, he and his followers would
never have confounded the legend about the
phoenix, which Herodotos tells us he derived
from others, with the tale of the phoenix, which
the Greek writer gives on his own authority.
The same tale had been already told by
Hekataeos, the authenticity of whose fragments
has been long ago proved by Wiedemann
against the doubts of the Continental critics
which have been reproduced in the Edinburgh
Review. I imagined (wrongly, as it seems) that
Herodotean critics in this country were ac-
quainted with the results of the discussion.
Now, as Wiedemann remarks in regard to the
phoenix (Geschichte Aegyptens, p. 86),
"It is impossible to assume that Hekataeos and
Herodotos, whose visits to Egypt were separated
by so many years, could both have received the
same false information to their enquiries about
things perfectly well known in Egypt; they must
rather have copied the one from the other, since
both related the same tale, and the copyist can
only have been Herodotos.""

This proof of my "unfairness" to Herodotos,
which is singled out by Sir George Cox, is a
good sample of the criticism with which my
criticism of the Greek historian has been met.
Ex hoc disce omnia.
A. H. SAYCE.

"HUNTING THE WREN."

however it may have arisen, had become quite senseless, was, when Thompson wrote, falling into disuse, and in 1845 the then Mayor of Cork by proclamation forbade its continuance. Mr. Halliwell (Nursery Rhymes, ed. 2, p. 248) notices the words there sung; while on February 4, 1846 (as same practice in the Isle of Man, and gives the appears by the Literary Gazette, p. 131, of the 7th of that month), Mr. Crofton Croker drew attention to the subject at a meeting of the British Archaeological Association, and it was stated that a similar custom existed in Pembrokeshire, where, on Twelfth Day, a wren was carried from house to house in a box with glass windows, surmounted by a wheel to which ribbons were hung. Sonnini (Voyage dans la Haute et la Basse Egypte, i., p. 18 mentions a like ceremony practised a century ago, towards the end of December, at La Ciotat, near Marseilles, but there the wren's murderers were armed with swords and pistols, and their victim was slung to a pole borne, as if it were a heavy load, on the shoulders of two men, who paraded the village, and then, after gravely weighing it in a pair of scales, all [present] gave themselves up to festivity.

"It is for antiquaries to throw light on the origin of this widely spread custom, of which many unsatisfactory explanations have been attempted. It has been ascribed to a wren which, alighting on a drumhead, roused and saved from defeat some Protestant troops in the Irish civil wars of the seventeenth century. Others refer it to a similar incident some centuries earlier in the wars of the Danish occupation of Ireland. Others say that the wren was an object of so great veneration to the 'Druids' that the early Christian missionaries enjoined its persecution upon all adherents of the new faith. Any speculations would here be futile, though one cannot but be struck by some coincidences. The wren, in the first line of the Irish song, is called the king of birds. The Pembroke. shire ceremony was, or is, performed on Twelfth Day-the feast of the Three Kings-and the bird was also spoken of as the king. The common name of the bird, shared to some extent with the

golden-crested wren, in most European languages, Basiliskos, Regulus, Reyezuelo, Reatino, Roitelet, Zan könig, Ellekonge, Winterkoninkje, and so forth-all assign to it the kingly dignity. These names probably are connected with the old and wellknown fable of birds choosing for their king that one of them which should mount highest in the This the eagle seemed to do, and all were ready to do him homage, when a loud burst of song was heard, and perched upon the eagle's head had been borne aloft by the giant. In England was the exultant wren, which, unseen and unfelt, the story does not seem to have had hold, and, so far from ascribing royal qualities to our little favourite, it is nearly everywhere known to us by the humbler name of 'Kitty' or 'Jenny' Wren."

Magdalene College, Cambridge: May 16, 1884.
I am very glad to see that this very interest-air.
ing subject has attracted notice once more, for
I am sure that much light has to be thrown
upon it before it can be understood. Permit
me here to reproduce the following extracts
from the history of the species as given in the
fourth edition of Yarrell's British Birds (vol. i.,
pp. 465, 466):—

would be a great satisfaction if anyone could point to any reasonable explanation of this very curious and doubtless very ancient custom, for such must be deemed one that, without reasonable cause assigned, extends from the shores of the Mediterranean to those of St. George's ALFRED NEWTON. Channel.

"The curious custom of 'hunting the wren' has Some parts of the foregoing extracts may be
been mentioned by many writers, but little can be
new to the readers of the ACADEMY; and to me
added to the accounts of it given by the late Sir it
Henry Ellis in his notes to Brand's Popular Antiqui-
ties (ii., p. 516), and by Thompson [Nat. Hist.
Ireland, Birds, i., pp. 319-52]; though, from its
practice obtaining in countries far apart, it is most
likely of much greater antiquity than has been
often supposed. It seems to have been first noticed
by Charles Smith in his State of the County of Cork
(ii., p. 334, note), published in 1750, as followed in
the South of Ireland, and subsequently by Val-
lancey (Collectanea de Rebus Hibernicis, iv., No. 13,
P. 97). On Christmas Day boys and men, each
using two sticks-one to beat the bushes, the other
to fling at the bird-went out in a body to hunt
and kill the wren, which, from its habit of making
but short flights, was no doubt soon done to death.
On the following day-the feast of St. Stephen-
the dead bird, hung by the legs between two hoops,
crossed at right angles and decked with ribbons,
was carried about by the 'wren-boys,' who sang a
song, beginning Droeilin, Droeilin, ri ant-eum'
(that is, Wren, Wren, king of birds '), and begged
This ceremony, which,
money to bury the wren.*

"To Mr. Norman Moore the editor is indebted for the Erse words of the song above quoted. In Mr. and Mrs. S. C. Hall's Ireland: its Scenery, Character, &c. (i, pp. 23-25), the entire English version, as sung in the county Cork, is given, together with the musical notes of the time."

THE "SWINBEORG OF KING ALFRED'S WILL. Weston-super-Mare: May 15, 1884. In King Alfred's will (Pauli, Life of Alfred, p. 409), we find that an arrangement as to the destiny of certain lands was made by Ethelred and Alfred at a Witenagemote at Swinbeorg. Has this place been identified? I had conjectured that the name is found in that of Swanborough hundred in Wilts; but I was unaware till a few days since of the exact spot. In Mr. G. Laurence Gomme's Primitive FolkMoots (Sampson Low, 1880) I read (p. 108):"The Rev. R. Nicholson kindly informs me that by the side of the road between Woodborough and Pewsey, Wilts, and in the parish of Manningford Bruce, is a hillock on which grow two y three ash-trees of no great age, but which it is possibly spring from the site of an old tree. It is

very remarkable document which I here print, with a translation, is one of the title-deeds of Westminster." It did not follow from this statement that Westminster was the present resting-place of the original. More than one enquirer has failed to trace it. After Kemble, Mr. Thorpe printed it in his Diplomatarium (1865) with this note:-" Unfortunately, I have not been successful in finding the MS., notwithstanding the good-will of the authorities at Westminster." This uncertainty the Ordnance Survey the document lies before us in good condition and in the unmistakable lineaments of the tenth century.

of Alfred at Bedwin, Pewsey, and Alton passed SATURDAY, May 31. 3 p.m. Royal Institution: "Micro- is now dissipated; among the facsimiles of by his will to his eldest son and heir, Edward, and these doubtless contained within their bounds this very Swanborough Tump.

66 one of those curious

The volume contains fifty-four documents,
of which the first eighteen belong to the Dean
and Chapter of Westminster; these are fol-
lowed by seventeen from the Dean and
Chapter of Exeter; the remaining nineteen
being from ten different proprietors, among
which five from the library of the Earl of
Ilchester form the largest single contribution.
The facsimile No. vii. of the Westminster
documents clears up a doubt which hung
over the fate of one of the most remarkable
pieces of Saxon antiquity. Mr. Sanders very
justly describes it as
narratives concerning property that are not
unfrequently met with among the Anglo-
Saxon charters." But there are very few
extant pieces which equal this one for interest.
It is a history of the personal vicissitudes of
the previous owners of the two estates of
Send and Sunbury, and how those estates
consequently came through Dunstan into the
possession of the church of Westminster.
This record was first published by Mr.
Kemble in 1857 in the Journal of the
Archaeological Institute. Mr. Kemble died
before the proofs were revised. All that he
had said about the original was this:-"The

surveyors at Exeter, that will in all probability help to give the required clue to the history of this problematical group of writings.

These documents have been referred to

CORRESPONDENCE.

THE EDITING OF MEDIAEVAL TEXTS.
London: May 17, 1884.

Mr. Hessels having misunderstood the purport of my last letter to the ACADEMY, I ven

is to be understood by a critical edition. He
asserts that an edition is critical or otherwise
according as it satisfies a certain palaeographical
That canon may be of the utmost im-

canon.

not only by such historians as Kemble, Free-portance to the philologist, and for his sake,
perhaps, to be followed. For the historical
man, Stubbs, and J. R. Green, but also, lately, reader it may be rather a nuisance than a
by Mr. Seebohm and Prof. Pollock, and other blessing. For the purposes of such a reader
writers on the history of land tenure; and the palaeographer pure and simple is quite
hence it becomes a matter of increasing im- incapable of preparing a critical edition. A
portance that we should ascertain the relative critical edition to the historian is one edited by
historical value of each piece in a collection a man who has made a study of the works of
which is of the most various quality. No- his author, of the thought of his time, and of
thing contributes so much to a scientific basis knowledge, just as much as palaeographical
the inner meaning of mediaeval life. This
of criticism as good facsimiles like those now detail, is needed to produce a critical edition;
before us.
J. EARLE.
and this knowledge is not wanting in Dr.
Buddensieg. Does Mr. Hessels think that
without this study the palaeographer can be a
critical editor? Would he not be the first to
assert that such a man ought not to venture on
a mediaeval text? What would he think, for
example, if an editor attempted, say, one of the
chief philosophical works of Wiclif, following
accurately the spelling of his MS., but abso-
lutely ignorant of the philosophy of Wiclif's
time, perhaps even of the contents of Wiclif's
greatest philosophical work, the Trialogus?
Such a thing is possible, albeit improbable.
Would Mr. Hessels consider that such an editor
could produce a critical edition? Let him
admit that something more is required to pro-
duce a critical edition than a mere mechanical
reproduction of the MS. There is a scholarship
which extends beyond, though it ought to in-
clude, the art of palaeography, and that scholar-
ship is an absolute necessity for all editions
which are to be critical for historical purposes.
The existence of that scholarship in Dr.
Buddensieg has produced to use the expres-
sion of Mr. Poole-a "work of signal merit,'
for which every historical student will be grate-
ful. The Wyclif Society may be congratulated
if they obtain editors who in any degree ap-
proach the same standard. KARL PEARSON.

ture again to trespass on your space. Mr. Hessels is apparently indignant that I still persist in terming Dr. Buddensieg's Wiclif a critical edition. He would have us believe that critical scholarship is purely a matter of palaeography. Now, the historical student is, as a rule, perfectly indifferent to philology; he reads a text for the thought or facts which it contains, and not for its word-forms. He wants a readable text, whence he can easily draw the sense of his author. I am quite ready to admit the importance of philological study; I am quite content that Mr. Hessels and other philologists who want mediaeval texts edited in one fashion rather than another should fill columns of the ACADEMY with indignant protest till they attain their end. The historical student can look on with perfect indifference so long as the success of Mr. Hessels and his fellows does not mean that the labour of reading mediaeval texts will be seriously augmented. But there are two points in this controversy which do affect the historical student. First, if mediaeval texts are to be edited verbatim from the MSS., all forms which are calculated to puzzle the ordinary reader should be accompanied by explanatory foot-notes, or rather, for easier perusal, the ordinary form put in the text and the MS. eccentricity in the foot-note. Mr. Hessels seems to make light of the difficulties presented by orthographical (sic) eccentricity to the historical reader. Now, if I mistake not, he once told me that he would, if he could, reproduce even the MS. abbreviations in the text. In other words, he would publish much such a text as the early printer did; every abbreviation and every eccentricity of the MS. before him would be reproduced, regardless of sense and regardless of the difficulty of perusal. If I do not misinterpret Mr. Hessels' views, he would vastly prefer Otto Brunfels' edition of the Trialogus, with its mediaeval spelling, to Lechler's, with its classical Latinity. Yet the historian who wishes to study life and thought, and not spelling, would undoubtedly declare for Lechler. Mr. Hessels may perhaps assert that one text is as easy to read as the other. For him, possibly; personally, I had spent hours over a page of Brunfels' edition

before I became aware that Lechler's text was far more readable. All I ask is that the task of the historical student shall not be made too hard for the sake of the palaeographer. Palaeography, albeit an important art, is but the handmaiden of history, and her first duty is to make things easy for her mistress. The mere palaeographer can only produce a text inferior to the worst photograph; the historical student wants more than that. This brings me to my second point with regard to Mr. Hessels' protest; that is its extremely narrow view of what

not quite understand how he could, on four or five occasions, declare, in very distinct terms, that he agrees with me, and yet "consider this question of orthography to be of no very great moment." I am contending (and I know many agree with me) for the faithful reproduction of all MSS., because several years' hard work on Mediaeval Latin has taught me the great value of such faithful reproduction, even of so-called evident mistakes. I consider the orthography to be of immense importance, even if only one language were concerned; but in the case of Mediaeval-Latin texts the orthofor the study of Mediaeval Latin itself, but for graphy of the MSS. is of importance, not only that of all the Romance languages, which, as we know, embraces a large portion of the English tongue. It is some comfort to know that Mr. Poole is, indeed, of opinion that MSS. should be faithfully adhered to, and, so far, we agree; but, when it comes to stating our reasons for adopting such a method, Mr. Poole gives no reason whatever for his opinion, and mine (the study of palaeography and philology) he "considers to be of no very great moment." This is not, I think, agreeing with me. However, there is no immediate danger, as Mr. Poole's text will satisfy, I believe, all reasonable demands. And I may, perhaps, hope that, when Mr. Poole has made the enquiries which I invited Dr. Buddensieg to make, we shall arrive at a more complete agreement than seems to exist between us at present.

J. H. HESSELS.

I

Frenchay Rectory, Bristol: May 10, 1884. In editing ninth- to eleventh-century MS. material for the Clarendon Press, chiefly the work of Anglo-Saxon and Irish penmen, ventured on a deviation from the MSS. not mentioned by Mr. R. L. Poole in his letter in the last ACADEMY, and, therefore, I suppose not adopted by him; I mean the introduction of capital letters after full stops. This seems to me to flow naturally from the first of his two admitted exceptions-the alteration of the Cambridge: May 17, 1884. original punctuation. With regard to all other Mr. Poole has done well, I think, in quoting capital letters, I faithfully followed the eccentrithe identical words he wrote in the Modern cities of the original scribes, omitting them Review regarding the editing of the Wiclif before proper names, and inserting them in volumes, as the extract quoted by Dr. Budden- their capricious and unmeaning, though rare, sieg suggested an opposite method to that appearances at the commencement of other and which he publicly advocated. I may perhaps ordinary words. It is to be hoped that we may be permitted to say a few words more, which, shortly have in England, what Dr. Buddensieg I trust, need not give rise to further correspond-states that they have already in Germany, ence.

F. E. WARREN.

generally accepted rules, laid down by some When I wrote my first letter of March 29 central literary authority, to regulate these and (ACADEMY, April 12) I did not know on what other details. The modernisation of the orthoparticular Wiclif work Mr. Poole was engaged.graphy in certain past volumes of the Rolls I had received, through the great kindness of Series, and in such present undertakings as Mr. Mr. Furnivall, proof-sheets of two Wiclif works W. de Gray Birch's Cartularium Anglo-Saronnow in the press (De civili dominio and De incar-icum, seems to me to detract considerably from natione Verbi), and had always been under the the value of those publications. impression that the first was edited by Mr. Matthew, the latter by Mr. Poole. As these proof-sheets showed, I thought, that these two editors faithfully adhered to the words and spellings of their MSS., or recorded in a footnote any reading of the MS. or MSS. which they felt compelled to reject for the text, I felt at liberty to tell Dr. Buddensieg that this was the true method of editing critically." Dr. Buddensieg's own method I called a bad one, with which we were already more familiar" in this country than he imagined.

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"

It now turns out that Mr. Poole has in hand the De civili dominio, and Mr. Harris (also of Oxford) the De incarnatione Verbi. The remarks I have made must, therefore, refer to these two editors, not to Mr. Matthew, who has just informed me, to my great regret, that he, objecting to the "strange" spellings of his MSS., has altered them, and is not able to go over his work again to rectify this.

Mr. Poole will, no doubt, pardon me if I do

an

CONTRIBUTIONS TO THE LATIN LEXICON. Edinburgh: May 5, 1884. The following list of Latin words not found in our latest and best Latin Lexicon, that of Profs. Lewis and Short-and the list is by no means exhaustive one-was jotted down in the course of my reading for Prof. Wölfflin's complete Latin Thesaurus, shortly to be published. The books read were the Commentaries on the New Testament (ed. Migne) of that by no means out-of-the-way writer, Jerome. The list may be useful in showing how far we still are from perfection even in a branch of study which has been more industriously and continuously pursued than perhaps any other. And it may also be interesting to the many careful students among your readers who may like to enrich the margins of their own copies therewith,