Page:Notes and Queries - Series 12 - Volume 1.djvu/247

 12 S. I. MAR. 25, 1916.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

241

LONDON, SATURDAY, MARCH

1916.

CONTENTS.-No. 13.


 * The ' Morire Encomium ' of Erasmus, 241

Movie of Bake, St. Germans, 242 Statues and Memorials in the British Isles. 243-Treico Abbey, Stilly, 244 Sir Humphry Davy's " Unknown " Traveller English Books printed on the Continent The Figure of Kuddha in the Eye and Neck, 245 Curious Anagrams Dr. Johnson's Knocker "Alinement," 246.

"QUERIES : ' A Tale of a Tub,' 246 Stothard's Illustra- tions of 'Don Quixote 'Drake's Drum Authors Wanted Countess of Huntingdon's Collection of Hymns : Chapels Wabab American Currant Collins : Asylum at Islington First English Colonists of Maryland : Gerard" Funeral Biscuits," 247 King's Own Scottish Borderers Colour of Mediaeval Wax Seals Eighteenth- Century Plate "Pat (Martha) Alexander, Tavern Keeper" Order for the English Pronunciation of Latin Johnstone of Lockerbie -The Third Yellow Quilts- James Scott, Engraver : Prentis, 248 Treasury Notes -Arms of Merton College, Oxford, 249.

UEPLIKS : Gennys of Launceston, 249 Cat Folk-Lore, 251 ' Pinafore ' and Tennis, 252 M. Belmayne, the French Schoolmaster Clerks in Holy Orders as Com- batantsDavid Martin, Painter, 253 " Hackney "The "Fly": The "Hackney" Turkish Crescent and Star, 254 Joanna la Loca Sir Christopher Corwen George Inn, Borough, 255 St. Mary Cray' Lines to a Watch ' Currency Notes Count Liitzow, 256 Allsworth, Artist -Capt. John Warde Materia Medica in the Talmudic Age Literature for Boys Oil-Painting " Boniface," an Innkeeper, 257 Memory at the Moment of Death Bx)mans in Kent Sir John Schorne Small Republics, 258.

NOTES ON BOOKS : ' East and West through Fifteen Centuries.'

French Books and Autographs.

"Notices to Correspondents.

THE

MOBILE ENCOMIUM' OF ERASMUS.

I POSSESS two editions of this delightful satire of Erasmus: one, "Cum Gerardi Listrii commentariis," published at Oxford, " Typis W. Hall, Impensis F. Oxlad sen. et F. Oxlad Jun. Anno 1663 " ; the other issued {recently, apparently, though dateless) at Leipzig, " ad fidem editionis antiquse Fro- benii ab auctore ipso recognitae, accurate edita, cum excerptis Gerardi Listrii notis." The " excerptae notse " in the latter are but diaphanous shadows of the " Commentarii " of the former. And the respective texts vary curiously both in punctuation and collocation. One specimen from each will serve to indicate this divergence. To (if possible) account for this is the first purpose -of this note, with a request for aid from those versed in the various editions of this work. The Oxford issue has at p. 54 :

"Jam quid dicam de Theophrasto? qui pro- .gressus in concionem, protinus obmutuit, perinde

quasi repente lupo conspecto ; qui militem ani- masset in bello. Isocrates ob ingenii timiditatem nee hiscere unquam est ausus."

The Leipzig reprint phrases and punctuates the passage thus :

" Jam quid dicam de Theophrasto ? qui progressus in concionem repente obmutuit, perinde repente quasi lupo conspecto. Qui militem animasset in bello, Isocrates ob ingenii timiditatem nee hiscere unquam est ausus."

To this is affixed the foot-note :

" Alise editt. in cone, protinus obm., perinde quasi repente lupo c. Post v. Qui mil. an. in bello et Frob. et alise habent signum interrog."

The difference between the two texts is, with the exception of the " protinus obmutuit " of the first and the " repente obmutuit " of the second, mainly one of punctuation and collocation, the sense being identical ; but the Leipzig editor, while professing to follow Froben, singularly omits, on his own showing, Froben' s note of interrogation. Which of the above re- presents the original printed text, and when and by whom was it printed ? This is my real quest. Froude (' Lectures on Erasmus '), with his usual assurance and inaccuracy, says the ' Morise Encomium ' was " brought out simultaneously with the edition of the New Testament." If this be so, the book was not published until 1519. As a matter of fact, it was probably eight years earlier, as argued thus by Mr. P. S. Allen in his monu- mental edition of the letters of Erasmus (vol. i. p. 459) :

"The 'Morise Encomium,' the first edition of which was published by Gilles Gourmant at Paris without date, and reprinted bv Schiirer at Stras- burg, Aug., 1511, and Oct., 1512, by Th. Martens at Antwerp* Jan., 1512, and by Badius in Paris,

27 July, 1512 The history of the composition of

the ' Moria ' has been obscured by the want of dates in the first edition and by an impossible year-date, 1508, which is added to the preface for the first time in the Froben edition of July, 1522,

and is retained in all subsequent issues Erasmus

wrote the ' Moria ' in More's house immediately after his return from Italy, but did not publish it at once. The month-date prevents any earlier year than 1510, since in any case he could not have

returned from Rome by 9 June, 1509 1511 may

therefore be accepted as the date of the first issue.*'

This is a bit of sound reasoning, though it lead only to an inferential verdict. Simi- larly, in his ' Age of Erasmus,' p. 143, Mr. Allen says : '

"From the autumn of 1509, when he returned from Italy and wrote 'The Praise of Folly' in More's house in Bucklersbury, until April, 1511, when he went to Paris to print it, Erasmus completely disappears from view."

But, these reasoned conjectures of a valued authority notwithstanding, it appears to me,