ublished anonymously in 1767, and he who would might
then have bought it for 'one shilling.' It was to be 'sold also by J.
Dodsley in Pall Mall, T. Davies in Russell-Street, Covent Garden, and
by the Book-sellers of Scotland.' This T. Davies was the very man who
introduced Boswell to Johnson. He was an actor as well as a
bookseller. _Dorando_ was a story with a key. Under the names of Don
Stocaccio, Don Tipponi, and Don Rodomontado real people were
described, and the facts of the 'famous Douglas cause' were presented
to the public. The little volume was suppressed in so far as that was
possible. It is rare, so rare that Boswell's latest biographer speaks
of it as the 'forlorn hope of the book-hunter,' though he doubts not
that copies of it are lurking in some private collection. One copy at
least is lurking in the Bibliotaph's library. He bought it, not for a
song to be sure, but very reasonably. The Bibliotaph declares that
this book is good for but one thing,--to shake in the faces of Boswell
collectors who haven't it.

The Bibliotaph had many literary heroes. Conspicuous among them were
Professor Richard Porson and Benjamin Jowett, the late master of
Balliol. The Bibliotaph collected everything that related to these two
men, all the books with which they had had anything to do, every
newspaper clipping and magazine article which threw light upon their
manners, habits, modes of thought. He especially loved to tell
anecdotes of Porson. He knew many. He had an interleaved copy of J.
Selby Watson's Life of Porson into which were copied a multitude of
facts not to be found in that amusing biography. The Bibliotaph used
to say that he would rather have known Porson than any other man of
his time. He used to quote this as one of the best illustrations of
Porson's wit, and one of the finest examples of the retort satiric to
be found in any language. One of Porson's works was assailed by
Wakefield and by Hermann, scholars to be sure, but scholars whose
scholarship Porson held in contempt. Being told of their attack Porson
only said that 'whatever he wrote in the future should be written in
such a way that those fellows wouldn't be able to reach it with their
fore-paws if they stood on their hind-legs to get at it!'

The Bibliotaph gave such an air of contemporaneity to his stories of
the great Greek professor that it seemed at times as if they were the
relations of one who had actually known Porson. So vividly did he
portra