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The other day we bought a charming little first edition of Candide (1759). The title-page is amusing: "Candide, ou l'Optimisme, traduit de l'Allemand de Mr. le Docteur Ralph"; no publisher or place, but the date MDCCLIX. It was often Voltaire's custom not to acknowledge his publications till they were a success. Zadig (1749) is similarly without author's or publisher's name.
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Perhaps some of our readers may be able to throw some light on a curious and interesting book, Specimens of Macaronic Poetry, published by J. Richard Beckley in 1831. The volume contains epics written on a single letter, like that which begins:
Cattorum canimus certemina clara canumque,
Odes in this style:
Emma! fer chartam, calamos, et inkum,
And the old Scottish Testament of Mr. Andro Kennedy, of which the first stanza runs:
I Master Andro Kennedy,
A matre quando sum vocatus,
Begotten with some incuby,
Or with some freir infatuatus;
In faith I can nocht tell redely,
Unde aut ubi fui natus,
But in truth I trow trewely.
Quod sum diabolus incarnatus.
No author's name is given and we have had no time or opportunity to make researches. But perhaps, as we have suggested, some of our readers may be able to give us the information desired.