(Continued from Vol. iii., p. 139.)
(43.) Is there any valid reason for not dating the publication of some of Gerson's treatises at Cologne earlier than the year 1470? and if good cause cannot be shown for withholding from them so high a rank in the scale of typographic being, must we not instantly reject every effort to extenuate Marchand's obtuseness in asserting with reference to Ulric Zell, "On ne voit des éditions de ce Zell qu'en 1494?" (Hist. de l'Imp., p. 56.)
Schelhorn's opinion as to the birthright of these tracts is sufficient to awaken an interest concerning them, for he conceived that they should be classed among the earliest works executed with cut moveable characters. (Diat. ad Card. Quirini lib., p. 25. Cf. Seemiller, i. 105.) So far as I can judge, an adequate measure of seniority has not been generally assigned to these Zellian specimens of printing, if it be granted "Coloniam Agrippinam post Moguntinenses primùm recepisse artem." (Meerman, ii. 106.) This writer's representation, in his ninth plate, of the type used in 1467, supplies us with ground for a complete conviction that these undated Gersonian manuals are at least as old as the Augustinus de singularitate clericorum. But why are they not older? Is there any document which has a stronger conjectural claim? Van de Velde's Catalogue, tome i. Gand, 1831, contains notices of some of them; and one volume before me has the first initial letter principally in blue and gold, the rest in red, and all elaborated with a pen. The most unevenly printed, and therefore, I suppose, the primitial gem, is the Tractatus de mendicitate spirituali, in which not only rubiform capitals, but whole words, have been inserted by a chirographer. It is, says Van de Velde, (the former possessor,) on the fly-leaf, "sans chiffres et réclames, en longues lignes de 27 lignes sur les pages entières." The full stop employed is a sort of twofold, recumbent, circumflex or caret; and the most eminent watermark in the paper is a Unicorn, bearing a much more suitable antelopian weapon than is that awkwardly horizontal horn prefixed by Dr. Dibdin to the Oryx in profile which he has depicted in plate vi. appertaining to his life of Caxton: Typographical Antiquities, vol. i.
(44.) Wherein do the ordinary Hymni et Sequentiæ differ from those according to the use of Sarum? Whose is the oldest Expositio commonly attached to both? and respecting it did Badius, in 1502, accomplish much beyond a revision and an amendment of the style? Was not Pynson, in 1497, the printer of the folio edition of the Hymns and Sequences entered in Mr. Dickinson's valuable List of English Service-Books, p. 8.; or is there inaccuracy in the succeeding line? Lastly, was the titular woodcut in Julian Notary's impression, A.D. 1504 (Dibdin, ii. 580.), derived from the decoration of the Hymnarius, and the Textus Sequentiarum cum optimo commento, set forth at Delft by Christian Snellaert, in 1496? From the first page of the latter we receive the following accession to our philological knowledge:
"Diabolus dicitur a dia, quod est duo, et bolos morsus; quasi dupliciter mordens; quia lædit hominem in corpore et anima."
(45.) (1.) In what edition of the Salisbury Missal did the amusing errors in the "Ordo Sponsalium" first occur; and how long were they continued? I allude to the husband's obligation, "to haue and to holde fro thys day wafor beter for wurs," &c., and to the wife's prudential promise, "to haue et to holde for thys day." (2.) Are there any vellum leaves in any copy in England of the folio impression very beautifully printed en rouge et noir "in alma Parisiorum academia," die x. Kal. April, 1510?
(46.) On the 11th of last month (Jan.) somebody advertised in "Notes and Queries" for Foxes and Firebrands. In these days of trouble and rebuke, when (if we may judge from a recent article savouring of Neal's second volume) it seems to be expected that English gentlemen will, in a Magazine that bears their name, be pleased with a réchauffé of democratic obloquy upon the character of the great reformer of their church, and will look with favour upon Canterburies Doome, would it not be desirable that Robert Ware's (and Nalson's) curious and important work should be republished? If a reprint of it were to be undertaken, I would direct attention to a copy in my possession of "The Third and Last Part," Lond. 1689, which has many alterations marked in MS. for a new edition, and which exhibits the autograph of Henry Ware.
(47.) Was Cohausen the composer of "Clericus Deperrucatus; sive, in fictitiis Clericorum Comis moderni seculi ostensa et explosa Vanitas: Cum Figuris: Autore Annœo Rhisenno Vecchio, Doctore Romano-Catholico," printed at Amsterdam, and inscribed to Pope Benedict XIII.? One of the well-finished copperplates, page 12., represents "Monsieur l'Abbé prenant du Tabac."
(48.) Where can a copy of the earliest edition of the Testamentum XII. Patriarcharum be found? for if one had been easily obtainable, Grabe, Cave, Oudin, and Wharton (Ang. Sac. ii. 345.) would not have treated the third impression as the first; and let it be noted by the way that "Clerico Elichero" in Wharton must be a mistake for "Clerico Nicolao." Moreover, how did the excellent Fabricius (Bibl. med. et inf. Latin., and also Cod. Pseudepig. V. T., i. 758.) happen to connect Menradus Moltherus with the editio princeps of 1483? It is certain that this writer's letter to Secerius, accompanying a transcript of Bishop Grossetête's version, which immediately came forth at Haguenau, was concluded "postridie Non. Januar. M.D.XXXII."
(49.) (1.) Who was the bibliopolist with whom originated the pernicious scheme of adapting newly printed title-pages to books which had had a previous existence? Sometimes the deception may be discerned even at a glance: for example, without the loss of many seconds, and by the aspect of a single letter, (the long s,) we can perceive the falsehood of the imprint, "Parisiis, apud Paul Mellier, 1842," together with "S.-Clodoaldi, è typographeo Belin-Mandar," grafted upon tome i.