From passages in Bentley's correspondence it also appears that Owen travelled in Holland on Bentley's behalf in 1706[87].
But long before this Owen had found himself unable, "through great poverty and being imprisoned on the amount of debts contracted," to carry out the Suidas agreement, and on 8 May, 1703, a new contract was made with Sir Theodore Janssen, who had already supplied Owen with large quantities of paper, for the completion of the work at the joint expense of the university and of Janssen himself, the editor's fee being fixed at £200[88].
As has been noted above, however, the Press continued to print certain other books for Owen. Thus Janssen writes to Crownfield on 19 October, 1704:
I have sent you to-day 150 Reams of fine genoa paper which is to be for ye use of Mr Jon Owen when he hath signed an agreement such as Dr Bentley doth require ...[89].
In later years Owen seems to have laid his misfortunes at Bentley's door, since, in a dedication written by him to "Elias Abenaker of London, Gent." and prefixed to Ockley's translation of Modena, History of the present Jews (ed. 1711), he writes:
I ... want Words to tell the World how much I am your Debtor, how often you have rescued me and my whole Family from the Jaws of Destruction; what noble Assistances you have supplied me with, to raise my Fortune in the World, and put my Affairs into a prosperous and flourishing Condition, had not a Person of an high Character, and a pretending Encourager of Arts and Sciences, and Printing in particular, (by the Encouragement of whose specious Promises I was induced to leave Oxford) been as Sedulous and Industrious to ruine and destroy me, by such Injustice and Cruelties, which if I should particularize, would gain Credit with few but those of the University of Cambridge, where the Fact is notoriously known[90].
In the meantime Kuster's edition of Suidas had duly appeared in 1705:
Kuster (writes Monk) having now, by means of his [Bentley's] patronage, completed the three noble volumes of his Suidas, their appearance raised the fame of the editor, while it excited public admiration at the spirit and liberality of the University of Cambridge in undertaking so magnificent a publication.