"I walke many times into the pleasaunt fieldes of the Holie Scriptures, where I plucke up the goodliesome herbes of sentences by pruning; eate them by readinge; chawe them by musing; and laye them up at length in ye state of memorie by gathering them together; that so, having tasted their sweetness, I may the lesse perceave the bitterness of this miserable life."
This was penned by the Queen, probably while she was in captivity at Woodstock, as the spirit it breathed affords a singular contrast to the towering haughtiness of her ordinary deportment.
Eliot's Indian Bible.
At the age of 42, John Eliot, pastor of a church at Roxbury, Mass., began the study of the Natick Indian dialect, with a view of translating the Bible into that language. He completed the translation in 1658, after a labor of eight years, and the book was issued in 1663. Upwards of one thousand copies were printed, of which twenty copies were dedicated to King Charles. The latter copies are so rare that one of them was sold in the U. S., in 1862, for $1000, and six years later for $1150. Among the many points of interest which Eliot's Indian Bible possesses, not the least is the fact that it is the language of a nation no longer in existence, and is almost the only monument of the race; another, that it is the first edition of the Bible published in this country.
Silver Book.
In the library of Upsal, in Sweden, there is preserved a translation of the four Gospels, printed with metal type upon violet-colored vellum. The letters are silver, and hence it has received the name of Codex Argenteus. The initial letters are in gold. It is supposed that the whole was printed in the same manner as book-binders letter the titles of books on the back. It was a very near approach to the art of printing, but it is not known how old it is.
Huge Copy of the Koran.
D'Israeli mentions a huge copy of the Koran—probably without a parallel, as to its size, in the annals of letters. The characters are described as three inches long; the book itself is a foot in thickness, and its other dimensions five feet by three.