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HISTORY OF PRINTING.

The Abbe Rive, superintendent of the Valliere libraiy, published, in 1779, an inflammatory notice of this garland ; and as he and the duke had the art of appreciating, and it has been said making spurious literary curiosities, this notice was no doubt the occasion of the mania- cal price. In the great French revolution, this litei«iry curiosity found its passage into this country. A bookseller offered it for sale at the enormous price of £500.

1632. A Slavonic New Testament was printed in the monastery of Kuteinski, in Russia, the exact site of which is not learnt. Another edidon appeared in the year 1652. — Henderson.

1632. The continuation of the Weekly News, No. 49,* in fourteen pages, printed for Nathaniel Butter.

1632. Catalogues of printed books first pub- lished in Ireland.

1632. The company of stationers contributed £160 toward the repairs of St. Paul's church.

1633. T%e English Traveller. As it hath heene jnthlikely acted at the Cock Pit, ill Drury Lane, by His Majettiet Servants. Written by Thomas Heywood.

Aot prodesae solent ant delectare.

London, printed by Robert Raworth, in Old Fish-street, neere Saint Mary Maudlins Church. Thomas Heywood was an actor and drama- tic writer who died early in thi^ reign. It is stated that he wrote two hundred and twenty pli»rs, of which only twenty-four are now extant, ana those of little merit. Mr. Hone, however, in his Table Book, thus speaks of Heywood, " If I were to be consulted as to a reprint of our old English dramatists, I should advise to begin with the collected plays of Heywood. He was a fellow-actor, and fellow-dramatist, with Shak- speare. He possessed not the imagination of the latter; but in all those qualities which gained for Shakspeare the attribute of gentle, he was not inferior to him. Generosity, courtesy, tempe- rance in the depths of passion ; sweetness, in a word, and gentleness, shine throughout his beau- tiful writings in a manner more conspicous than in those of Shakspeare, but only more conspicu- ous inasmuch as m Heywood these qualities are primary, in the other subordinate to poetry. I Jove them both equally, but Shakspeare has most of my wonder."

1633. Adoustos Matthewes printed the following play : A Match at Midnight. A plea- sant comedie, as it hath beene acted by the chil- dren of the revels. Written by William Rowley.

London : printed by Augustus Matthewes, for William Sheares, and are to be sold at his shop in Brittaines Burse.

William Rowley lived in the reign of James I. and wrote eleven plays, and was also engaged in eight other plays with Heywood, Middleton

• In thta list, geneiBlly speaking, the first number only Is noticed ; but, In some few instances, the earlier papers not luiTing been preserved, the earliest that is known to exist will be mentioned.

Massinger, Day, and others. There «tB a Samuel Rowley who lived at the same lime, and was the author of two plays.

1633. In this year secretary Windebank, in a letter to the lord deputy Straflbrd, ordered a book which had been imported into Ireland from Loraine, to be suppressed, and to call the autliOT, Peter Lombard, titular primate of Armagh, to account for the same, who it appears was dead at that period. It appears that so late as this period, very few works were printed in Ireland. The progress of printing was probably retarded for many years by the unfortunate state of the country, and the tyranny of the star chamber, the arbitrary decrees of which compelled those who were opposed to the established order of things, to have recourse to the printing of their works in a foreign land.

1 633. Mr. Locke left a legacy of £50 towards building the stationers' hall ; and a piece of pkte value £10.

1633. The desire of news from the capital, on the part of the wealthier country residents, and probably the false information of the news writers, led to the establishment of a verf curioiu trade, that of a news corresipondent, who, for a subscription of three or four pounds per annum, wrote a letter of news every post day to his sub- scriber in the country; and the trade of a news correspondent at length seems to have suggested a sort of union of written news and published news. In the household book of Skipton castle, in Yorkshire, in this year, there is the following item : — paid to captayne Robinson, by my lord's command, for writing letters of newes to his lord- ship, for half a year, five pounds." The practice was continued bj- this family till the year 1687.

1633, Nov. Mr. Green, a printer, who had taken some ofience from archbishop Laud, was committed to Newgate for going to court at Sl James's, with a great sword by his side, swearing the king should do him justice, or he would take another course with the prelate. "All the harm," says the archbishop, " that I ever did him, was, that being a poor printer, I procured him of the stationers' company, five pounds a year for life."

1634, March 16. Died, Simon Waterson, citizen and stationer, of London, aged 72 years. He was son of Richard Waterson, noticed at page 337, ante. He had a monument to his memory in the church of St. Paul, with a veij long Latin epitaph, erected by his son John.

1634, Died, Peter de Jode, a celebrated engraver on wood, at Antwerp, was pupil of Gottzins. He designed correctly, and was less a mannerist than his master.

1634. A Maske, presented at Ludlow castle, on Michaelmas night, before the right honoor- able John, earle of Bridgewater, viscount Brack- ley, lord president of Wales, and one of his majesties most honourable privie counsell. Lon- don: printed for Humphrey Robinson, at the signe of the Thi-ee Pidgeons, in Paul's Church- yard. 1637. This is the first edition of Mil- ton's Masfftu of Comus, a copy of which is in the GarricK collection.