604 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



[No. 139. 



P.S. Owing to some unaccountable inadvertence, 

 I have only just seen the number of "N. & Q." 

 containing the highly interesting communications 

 of H.B.C. and Mr. Stephens. Will Mr. Ste- 

 phens allow me to ask him where he procured his 

 tale, for I agree with H. B. C. that it is " desirable 

 to fix the localities as nearly as possible." My 

 version came from the Gloucestershire side of the 

 county. 



DR. THOMAS MORELI.'S COPY OF H. STEPHENS 

 EDIT. OP jESCHYI-€S, 1557, WITH MSS. NOTES. 



As your valuable paper is in the hands of 

 scholars of every description in every part of the 

 world, the following communication may meet the 

 eye, and be of no slight interest to some of your 

 classical readers, and, at the same time, give a 

 stimulus to hunters at bookstalls. Some time 

 since, in one of my hunts, I stumbled upon a very 

 fine copy of Pet. Victorine's (Vettori) edition of 

 -ZEschylus, printed by H. Stephens, 1557. I was 

 much gratified in finding it, had belonged to the 

 celebrated Thomas Morel!, D.D., F.R.S., F.S.A,, 

 the lexicographer, and had his book-plate and 

 autograph. The margins were filled with many 

 conjectures and emendations written in two very 

 ancient hands, and, besides, some MSS. Scholia 

 on the Prometheus and Poesa. In carefully ex- 

 amining them I found many were marked with 

 the letters (A) and (P). I remembered the pre- 

 sent very learned Bishop of London, in the preface 

 to his edition of the Chocephorce, mentioned the 

 vast assistance he had received in editing that 

 play from a copy of this very edition of -^^schylus 

 (H. Stephens, 1557), lent to him by Mr. Mitford, 

 the margins of which were similarly marked. The 

 "bishop observes these emendations were by Aura- 

 tus and Portus, two learned French scholars ; and 

 that Mr. Mitford's volume contained several other 

 emendations without the signatures (A) and (P), 

 ■which he, for distinction's sake, marked (Q). Now 

 my copy also possessed these readings marked (Q). 

 The bishop further observed, that the writer of 

 the MSS. notes was a cotemporary of Casaubon's 

 from a remark at p. 14. of the volume. The 

 learned bishop's description of the volume will be 

 found in the Museum Criticum, vol. ii. p. 488. I 

 at first imagined I had met with this identical 

 volume ; but a closer examination proved I was 

 mistaken, as my copy, besides all those carefully 

 noted by Dr. Blomfield, contained many other 

 emendations, but had not the note at p. 14. of the 

 Prometheus. Whoever was the copier or writer 

 of the marginal MSS. in my volume, was evi- 

 dently a Frenchman, as some of the notes are in 

 French. The handwriting is very ancient and 

 contracted, and has the appearance of being of 

 the early portion of the seventeenth century. 

 The most interesting part, however, of the story 



still remains. Dr. Thomas Morell edited the 

 Prometheus, 4to., 1773. The title is as follows: 

 JEschyli P. V. cum Stanl. Versione et Scholiis, o, /3, 

 (et 7 inedUis), Sfc. Now these Scholia y, which he 

 professes to give for the first time, I found to be 

 those in the very ancient hand in the margin of 

 my volume. He frequently also gives the various 

 marginal readings, and styles them " Marg. MS." 

 Moreover he occasionally adopts these notes with- 

 out any acknowledgment, especially where they 

 throw any light on the text. The volume then is 

 of great curiosity and value. From a curious 

 note at the end of the Prometheus, Morell takes 

 nine iambic lines, to which is affixed " Ad Calcem 

 Dramatis MS. Regii." From this it would seem 

 the Scholia were taken from a MS. in the E,oyal 

 Library at Paris. 



We may observe then as a remarkable circum- 

 stance, that while Bishop Blomfield was describing 

 the copy belonging to Mr. Mitford, a similar copy, 

 with more notes, and of equal antiquity as to the 

 MSS. emendations, was in existence, and had once 

 been in the possession of, and of much assistance 

 to the great Dr. Morell. Where Morell got this 

 volume, and how he should not have acknowledged 

 the aid he derived from it, is a mystery. As I 

 mentioned before, the handwriting is far prior to 

 Morell's day. The volume is rendered still more 

 interesting by its having many of Stanley's emen- 

 dations, about which such a controversy arose 

 from the observations made by Blomfield in his 

 preface to the Agamemnon. And I am almost 

 induced to think it might originally have belonged 

 to Stanley, who made a similar use of it to what 

 Morell did. Many of the emendations are still 

 inedited. This valuable volume, therefore, is of 

 great interest, (1) from the vast number of MSS. 

 readings, and (2) from its having been formerly 

 in the possession of Dr. Morell, and the circum- 

 stances above mentioned. It is a very large and 

 clean copy of the now scarce edition of H. Ste- 

 phens ; and your bibliographical readers will be 

 astonished to hear I purchased it for one shilling I 

 I may mention I showed it to the Bishop of Lon- 

 don and Dr. Wordsworth, Canon of Westminster, 

 who were both interested with it. The latter 

 showed me in return several volumes of MSS. 

 collections for a new edition of J<^schylu3, made 

 by his lamented brother the late Mr. John Words- 

 worth, Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge, 

 perhaps the profoundest Greek scholar next to 

 Person the University of Cambridge ever pos- 

 sessed, and who so ably reviewed Professor Schole- 

 field's iEschylus in the Philological Museum. The 

 classical world can never sufficiently regret that 

 death prevented us from receiving at his hands a 

 first-rate edition of this noble poet, as he had 

 been at much pains in travelling all over the 

 Continent, and examining all the MSS. extant \ 

 and from his known partiality to the author, and 



