tween
which years the entry stands--1623 and 1626.

Sir Clement Cottrell's book about Spenser.

Captain Power, to know if he has heard from Capt. Spenser about my
letter of inquiries relating to Edward Spenser.

Of Whiston, to examine if my remarks on Spenser are complete as to
the press--Yes.

Remember, when I see Mr. W. Thompson, to inquire whether he has
printed in any of his works any other character of our old poets
than those of Spenser and Shakspeare;[353] and to get the liberty of
a visit at Kentish Town, to see his _Collection of Robert Greene's
Works_, in about _four large volumes quarto_. He commonly published a
pamphlet every term, as his acquaintance Tom Nash informs us.

Two or three other memorials may excite a smile at his peculiar habits
of study, and unceasing vigilance to draw from original sources of
information.

_Dryden's Dream_, at Lord Exeter's, at Burleigh, while he was
translating Virgil, as Signior Verrio, then painting there, related
it to the Yorkshire painter, of whom I had it, lies in _the parchment
book in quarto_, designed for his life.

At a subsequent period Oldys inserts, "Now entered therein." Malone
quotes this very memorandum, which he discovered in _Oldys's Langbaine_,
to show Dryden had some confidence in Oneirocriticism, and supposed that
future events were sometimes prognosticated by dreams. Malone adds,
"Where either the _loose_ prophetic _leaf_ or the _parchment book_ now
is, I know not."[354]

Unquestionably we have incurred a great loss in Oldys's collections for
Dryden's Life, which are very extensive; such a mass of literary history
cannot have perished unless by accident; and I suspect that many of
_Oldys's manuscripts_ are in the possession of individuals who are not
acquainted with his hand-writing, which may be easily verified.

To search the old papers in one of my large deal boxes for Dryden's
letter of thanks to my father, for some communication relating to
Plutarch, while they and others were publishing a translation of
Plutarch's Lives, in five volumes 8vo. 1683. It is copied in _the
yellow book for Dryden's Life_, in which there are about 150
transcriptions, in prose and verse, relating to the life, character,
and writings of Dryden.--Is England's Remembrancer extracted out of
my _obit._ (obituary) into my remarks on him in the _poetical bag_?

My extracts in the _parchment bu