me from Aukenvyke, Sep. 25, 1734) in the copying; well
knowing your exactness." _Benedict Abbas_, vol ii., 870. But
this servility of transcription was frequently the cause of
multiplying, by propagating, errors. If Hearne had seen the
word "faith" thus disjointed--"fay the"--he would have
adhered to this error, for "faythe." As indeed he has
committed a similar one, in the _Battle of Agincourt_, in
the appendix to Thomas de Elmham: for he writes "breth
reneverichone"--instead of "brethren everichone"--as Mr.
Evans has properly printed it, in his recent edition of his
father's _Collection of Old Ballads_, vol. ii., 334. But
this may be thought trifling. It is certainly not here meant
to justify capriciousness of copying; but surely an obvious
corruption of reading may be restored to its genuine state:
unless, indeed, we are resolved to consider antiquity and
perfection as synonymous terms. But there are some traits in
Hearne's character which must make us forgive and forget
this blind adherence to the errors of antiquity. He was so
warm a lover of every thing in the shape of a BOOK that, in
the preface to _Alured of Beverley_, pp. v. vi., he says
that he jumped almost out of his skin for joy, on reading a
certain MS. which Thomas Rawlinson sent to him ("vix credi
potest qua voluptate, qua animi alacritate, perlegerim,"
&c.). Similar feelings possessed him on a like occasion:
"When the pious author (of the _Antiquities of Glastonbury_)
first put it (the MS.) into my hands, I read it over with as
much delight as I have done anything whatsoever upon the
subject of antiquity, and I was earnest with him to print
it," p. lxxviii. Hearne's horror of book-devastations is
expressed upon a variety of occasions: and what will
reconcile him to a great portion of _modern_ readers--and
especially of those who condescend to read this account of
him--his attachment to the black-letter was marvelously
enthusiastic! Witness his pathetic appeal to the English
nation, in the 26th section of his preface to _Robert of
Gloucester's Chronicle_, where he almost predicts the
extinction of "right good" literature, on the disappearance
of the _black-letter_! And here let us draw towards the
close of these HEARNEANA, by contemplating a wood-cut
portrai