1906-7. TRANSACTIONS. 123 



so strict — no one, not even the most eminent writers, could secure 

 acceptance of their articles unless approved after careful scrutiny. 

 No other editor of the encyclopsedia would have dared to reject 

 articles by men of world-wide eminence — yet, the article on Burns 

 by that brilliant Scotsman — (compared by some to Scott himself) 

 — Robert Louis Stevenson, was put in the editorial waste-paper 

 basket, as not fulfilling the conditions or reaching the standard 

 imposed by the editor. Professor Baynes paid for the article on 

 Burns, but it was returned to its author, and its place was taken 

 by an account of the Scottish poet more in accordance with the 

 character of the Ninth Edition. Baynes was the utter reverse 

 of a martinet. He knew, no one better, the literary greatness of 

 Stevenson, for it was to his own intimate friend and colleague, 

 Principal Tulloch, that all Stevenson's earlier productions were 

 sent by his mother. Tulloch's judgment was invariably sought 

 before Stevenson sent his contributions to the various magazines. 

 Coleridge had criticised the editorial policy of former days, es- 

 pecially the license allowed under the " planless plan, " he styled 

 it, of encyclopsedia editors universally, whereby "instead of a 

 systematic history of the received truths and established dis- 

 coveries in the department of knowledge, which was to have been 

 exhibited, the larger portion of the space is filled up with the indi- 

 vidual writer's own crude conceptions and prolix argumentation. " 

 Professor Baynes, in his modest editorial note, dated St. Andrews, 

 June 1st, 1875, in the first volume of the original issue of the 

 ninth edition — read doubtless by few of the tens of thousands of 

 readers who consult the work — says ''it has to do with knowledge 

 rather than with opinion. Its main duty is to give an accurate 

 account of the facts and an impartial summary of results in every 

 department of inquiry and research. " Those who knew Pro- 

 fessor Baynes realized how onerous and how exacting the task of 

 editing the encyclopaedia would be in his hands — so scrupulous, 

 so thorough — so critically unsparing, yet appreciative. One can 

 hardly realise the weight of this herculean labour, and there is 

 intense humour in the letter to Baynes Principal Tulloch wrote 

 in 1876 when busy with a -hundred public duties — University 

 lectures, Scottish Education Board meetings. Church Assembly 

 functions, literary work, and responsibilities at Balmoral Castle 

 as Queen's chaplain. "I scarcely know what I am doing" he 

 says but he added, in a fine spirit of banter, ''You are a lucky 

 fellow that have only got your 'Encyclopaedia ' to attend to. " Tul- 



