Page:The Great Didactic of John Amos Comenius (1896).pdf/137

 dialogues of his own composition treating of Mexico and its institutions. Though Colloquies in the strict sense were lacking, it must not be imagined that the English school-boy of the sixteenth century was without a convenient hand-book of phrases. The Vulgary of Stanbridg gives a list of useful sentences, and these the scholars were doubtless made to learn by heart with a view to using them in their daily conversation:—

It is difficult to imagine a boy eulogising one of his “chums” with the remark, “He is born to drink well, both on the faders side and moders side”; but Stanbridge duly provides for the emergency—“Ex utraque parentum parte aptus ad bibendum nascitur.” Even for the sententious scholar proverbial expressions are given—

Of a more pretentious though less practical nature was the Vulgary of William Horman, headmaster of Eton. Horman cannot be congratulated on the selection of his phrases, which are arranged under thirty-seven heads. “Put not your trust in a bunglar of printer’s craft,” “Mancipem libraria officinæ ne sequaris,” is not good material for the