tile aux bibliothecaires, archivistes, imprimeurs, libraires, &c. Par
G. Peignot, Bibliothecaire de la Haute-Saone, membre-correspondant de la
Societe libre d'emulation du Haut-Rhin. _Indocti discant, et ament
meminisse periti._ Paris, An x. 1802."

Here follows a rival specimen selected from the same department of
literature:--

"BIBLIOGRAPHIE INSTRUCTIVE; OU, TRAITE DE LA CONNAISSANCE DES LIVRES
RARES ET SINGULIERS; contenant un catalogue raisonne de la plus grande
partie de ces livres precieux, qui ont paru successivement dans la
republique des lettres, depuis l'invention de l'imprimerie jusqu'a nos
jours; avec des notes sur la difference et la rarete de leurs editions,
et des remarques sur l'origine de cette rarete actuelle, et son degre
plus ou moins considerable; la maniere de distinguer les editions
originales, d'avec les contrefaites; avec une description typographique
particuliere, du compose de ces rares volumes, au moyen de laquelle il
sera aise de reconnoitre facilement les exemplaires, ou mutiles en
partie, ou absolument imparfaits, qui s'en rencontrent journellement
dans le commerce, et de les distinguer surement de ceux qui seront
exactement complets dans toutes leurs parties. Dispose par ordre de
matieres et de facultes, suivant le systeme bibliographique generalement
adopte; avec une table generale des auteurs, et un systeme complet de
bibliographie choisie. Par Guillaume-Francois de Bure le jeune, Libraire
de Paris."]

It is a remarkable thing that a man should have been imprisoned, and had
his ears cut off, and become one of the chief causes of our great civil
wars, all along of an unfortunate word or two in the last page of a book
containing more than a thousand. It was as far down in his very index as
W that the great offence in Prynne's Histrio-Mastix was found, under the
head "Women actors." The words which follow are rather unquotable in
this nineteenth century; but it was a very odd compliment to Queen
Henrietta Maria to presume that these words must refer to her--something
like Hugo's sarcasm that, when the Parisian police overhear any one use
the terms "ruffian" and "scoundrel," they say, "You must be speaking of
the Emperor." The Histrio-Mastix was, in fact, so big and so complex a
thicket of confusion, that it had been licensed without examination by
the licenser, who perhaps trusted that the world would have as little
inclination to peruse it as he had. The calamitous discovery of the
st