There may be some excuse for H. B. as he confesses (Vol. v., p. 182.) himself to be freshman in the pages of "N. & Q.;" and therefore he is a stranger to the tone of courtesy and good humour which are so essential to the prosperity, maintenance, and extension of your very useful periodical. A little more experience in his readings, and less of self-opiniatedness, would have spared him the severe but merited remarks of MR. L. EVANS (Vol. v., p. 207.).
As of old all writers were wont to consider their readers most courteous, so let those who write for your pages reverse this rule—and then there will be nothing contrary to such a tone, to the injury of "N. & Q."
S. S.
Quid est Episcopus (Vol. v., p. 177.).
—This passage does not, as X. G. X. thinks, come from Irenæus, but from St. Austin. I find the reference to it in Bingham's Antiquities (vol. i. p. 72. ed. 1843), where the whole passage is thus quoted at the foot of the page:
"Quid est episcopus, nisi primus presbyter, id est, summus sacerdos?"—Aug. Quæst. Vet. et N. Test. c. ci.
F. A.
Paper-making in England (Vol. v., p. 83.).
—I do not pretend to know anything of the history of paper-making; but it may be well to send you a passage from Fuller's Worthies (Vol. i. p. 224., ed. Nuttall), which lately fell in my way:
"Paper is entered as a manufacture of this county [Cambridgeshire], because there are mills nigh Sturbridge fair, where paper was made in the memory of our fathers. Pity the making thereof is disused: considering the vast sums yearly expended in our land for paper out of Italy, France, and Germany, which might be lessened, were it made in our nation."