390 Greek aud Latin Palaeography. [March 19, 



national hands began in most countries to pass into slovenly age in 

 the fifteenth century, wc owe it to the sense of beauty in the Italians 

 that a better model than that period could afford was found for the 

 choicest types for the newlj invented art of printing. The Carlo- 

 vingian writing had passed into a beautiful form under the hands of 

 the Italian scribes of the eleventh and twelfth centuries ; and when, 

 in the Eenaissance, fastidious taste rejected contemporary writing as 

 not being excellent enough for the highest standard, it was to that 

 earlier form that men again turned as the only pattern fit for the 

 reproduction of manuscripts of the classics, and then for the printing 

 of books, in the type, so perfect in its simplicity, which we call 

 Eoman. 



[E. M. T.] 



