utograph between the Otwaysians and the Butlerites, dividing
the collecting world into two rival parties, we shall not here enter
into it. In all such matters it is better to go at once to the fountain
head; if the reader is curious on the subject, as doubtless he must be,
he is referred to one octavo and five duodecimo volumes, with fifty
pamphlets which have left little to say on the point. Let it not be
supposed, however, for an instant, that the writer of this article is
himself undecided in his opinion on this question. By no means; and he
hastens to repel the unjust suspicion, by declaring himself one of the
warmest Otwaysians. It is true that he has some private grounds for
believing that a dispassionate inquiry might lead one to doubt whether
Otway or Butler ever saw the Lumley autograph; but what of that, who
has time or inclination for dispassionate investigation in these
stirring days! In the present age of universal enlightenment, we don't
trouble ourselves to make up our opinions--we take and give them, we
beg, borrow, and steal them. True, there are controversies involving
matters so important in their consequences, so serious in their nature,
that one might conceive either indifference or fanaticism equally
inexcusable with regard to them; but there are also a thousand other
subjects of discussion, at the present day, of that peculiar character
which can only thrive when supported by passion and prejudice, and
falling in with a dispute of this nature, it is absolutely necessary to
jump at once into fanaticism. Accordingly, I had no sooner obtained a
glimpse of the letter of the starving poet, embalmed within the
precious leaves of one of the most noted albums of Europe, than I
immediately enlisted under Lady Holberton's colors as a faithful
Otwaysian. With that excellent lady I take a tragical view of the
Lumley Letter, conceiving that a man must be blind as a bat, not to see
that it was written by the author of Venice Preserved, and this in
spite of other celebrated collectors, who find in the same sheet so
much that is comical and Hudibrastic. Strange that any man in his
senses should hold such an opinion--yet the Butlerites number strong,
some of them are respectable people, too; more's the pity that such
should be the case.

As we have already observed, the controversy began in the library of
Sir John Blank, and it continued throughout the life-time of that
excellent and well-known collector. At his d