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    ! A PRACTICAL SUGGESTION.

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    THE LITERARY HISTORY OF EDIN-• TT-fc TTT...

• Transcript

  • Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.

    Additionally, when viewing full transcripts, extracted text may not be in the same order as the original document.

    Gonlinenlal T\Oles

    readers which has by jreQ H ^ pc ^ iitl ^ Bert coin ^ Ql © 4 to y ^ 2- , of The Stanley news '

    expeditio VV lllV / ii uw n lends . iyy « ifvi : an y j .. L * increased -vwujtR . wv interest us uo va . K ^ to vc «&« a re jr - s *>¦ production of tlip great explorer ' s interesting

    book at this time . The same firm also projl mises 1 HSt / O a a > pop ^/ u ^; ular uu » i cuj edi ; tion Vxuii kjm of . Nbrd xivlucuobxvuu enskidld ' o s

    Voyage of the " Vega " round Europe and Asia , ' and of Gustav Nachtigal's 'Journeys

    in the oanara and the ooudan .

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    \ \ ~ ' ^ ipsjjl ^ '' ' " - - * ' •¦ ¦ : ' ¦ ' x * "~ ¦>'¦ * ' ' ' *"' " cV > aji 7 > V I '' y- mmmi ^^ j ^ l ^ Nov . isv , 0 * & 7 ^@^/^ b ^ iQ !^ :.. 0 b : eaIir . - ^ mV | , 7 i | - , - - . , , - ¦¦ . ¦¦ - ¦ - ¦¦ - - . ry ^ ffffit .- •; i ;

    ! A Practical Suggestion.

    ! A PRACTICAL SUGGESTION .

    To the Editor oftlve Publishers' Circular . Sir , —The ___ letter that appeare JLJLd under this

    I lieading in your issue of October 15 , raises a question that must interest all who have to do with 1 ibraries . While fully agreeing with your

    correspondent , Mr . Hutton , that the present system is most unsatisfactory , I think that his proposed classification would hardly give

    informatioii enough , and I would suggest that the actual measurement up the back , and along the head , of every book , should be given in inchesand decimalsof an inch . It would be

    sufficient , for all prac , tical purposes to carry out the decimal to one point only : thusa crown

    , 8 demy vo . book 8 vo , . would as -Bf 5 be x 5 catalogued # 4 ; fouir figures as 7 * 7 g x iving 5 , a "

    the size of any book to the tenth of an inch . This may appear complicated at first sight ; but if the size were printed thus in tne

    lefthand bottom corner of the title-page of all new hooks and — new editions _ — — _ published ^ _ - _ _ , peop ^ le _

    would soon get to know the size nearer than the present catalogues give itwithout a measure

    and A with one they could , , of course , tell it , exactly—a great boon at a time when so many

    odd size 3 and so . many different editions are issued . This plan seems to combine simplicity and

    . accuracy , and certainly answers with the few books t have tried it with ; but there may be

    some difficulty in its application ! to large libraries and books in general that I have

    not noticed . —Yours faithfully ,

    November Frome 7 , 1889 . Russell K . Tanner .

    The Literary History Of Edin-• Tt-Fc Ttt...

    THE LITERARY HISTORY OF

    EDIN-• BURGH TT-fc TTT Vk > " ¦>» TT . ! Professor Masson has just made an

    in-I of teresting Edinburg contribution h . This history to the , he literary says , may history be

    said to have begun in the reigns of the Scottish Kings James IV . ( 1488-1513 ) and James V .

    ( 1513-1542 ) . There had been a good deal of scattered literary activity in Scotland before

    all , of course , in manuscript only—in which Edinburgh had . shared ; but it was not till those tw /< j > rei—when Edinburgh had

    begns I come distinctly the . capital of the Scottish I Kingdomand was wwt in possession irfMf of ^* a printing »/¦ fe

    -I ) press ^^ or ^ " ^ *»*»• two , m ^ F * — 4 bl ^ fe rit v . was * ^ 4 »« B > ' not ¦"* ^ "" w ^ v ^ till ^• ^^ then * ff * ¦¦»» that w « a •« 4 feA Edin «* v *«* M | - kurgh could claim to be the central seat of the

    II vjra nectiQn Scottish viu 1 o muses f Sir Dmvid After Lindsay allu 4 i « , Dunbar to the , con and

    -JJouglas , wiph ^ he , cit < y ,, the Jrrofeseor ^ ^** - ^ " ^ ^ ^—^<——^—i ^— »—i—^———— rmy ^ nv ^

    goes on to note ^ \ the relationship of John Kno : ^ , I ; \ and an / 1 i Geo « ant >/ va Buchanan RnnVionnrt It T-4- nrna in Z-n Edinburgh 14 ^^ -1 i % - % ' 1-vi % »< - ! I *

    rge . was that Buchanan published hid 'Baptistes / his * De Juro Regni apud Scofcos ? and others of

    his writings in verse or in prose ,, ; and it was in an Edinburgh « " ¦ — lodg t jB ing J . » that he ' — - v < died ™^ in , # 1582 I " — .

    after having sent to the press the last 'proof sheets of his 'Rerum Seoticarum Historia / or

    Latin History of Scotland . Professor Masson thinks the first eighty years of the sixteenth

    century may be regarded , the pre-Reformation authorship and the post-Reformation authorship h taken togetheras one definitely marked f

    age - — — —~ . — — It — — - — was an ^ r ^^ M ^^ age ^^ ^^^ ^ , ^ m of ^^^^ hi ^^ gh c ^^^ r ^^^ ^ edit —^^ ^^^^ ^^^ ^^ ^^ t ^^ o J Sc ^^»^^^ o v ^ r ^ v ttish ^^^ ^^^^^ " ^^^ ^^^^ literary ^^ history ^ . Scotland __ . _ was . ___ then _ ___ — — no — — whit _ _

    inferior to contemporary England in literary power and productiveness . On the contrary , as it is admitted now by the historians of

    English literature that , in the long tract of time between the death of Chaucer and the appearance of Spenserit was in Scotland

    , rather than in England that the real succession to Chaucer was kept up in the British Islands ,

    so it must be admitted that it was , in the last eihty years of tha $ long period of comparative

    gloom g in England that the torch that had been kindled in Scotland was passed there most

    nimbly and brilliantly from hand to hand . Referring to the brilliant eras in England of

    Spenser , Bacon , Shakspeare , Milton , Jeremy TaylorBunyanDrydenand

    LockeProfessor Masson , says , there was , literary povert , y in Scotland jluring those periods ; and , in

    answering the question , *< What was the cause of this poverty f' he says the loss of the benefits of a resident — - _ Scottish _ fcingshi - ^ pconsequent — - ~ j ^ - —on

    the removal of the Court ^ . j to Eng j ^ , land in 1603 , may ^^^ t ^ p ^ v ^^^ ^^ v ^ p ^ m have w ^™ ^^^^^ ¦ ^^ ^ ^ ¦ ^^ had ^^~ ^ " ^~ ^^ ~^ ^ some — ~^^ ^^— ^ ^ effect ^ - ^ ™ ^^ ^ - ^^ . ^ No ™ « — ¦ i chance ^^^ ^^ " ^^» ^^ - ^^^ ^^^^^ ~^^ r ^^^ r after ^^^^^ ^^^ ^^^ - ^^ - ^^^^

    that of Napier ' s desired agency of a mighty royal Maecenas in Holyrood for stirring the

    Scottish * ingines . ' A more certain cause , however — is to be found in the agonising

    intensitwith , which , through / the whole cj of the n century y »/ and a quarter from 1580 onwards , the soul and

    heart of Scotland , in all classes of the community alike , were occupied with the

    successive phases of the one vexed question of Presbytery - versus - Episcopacy in Church

    government , and its theological and political concomitants .

    A revival , Professor Masson points out , came in the ei g 3 hteenth century , just « f after the union __ - _

    of Scotland with England , and he awards to Allan Ramsay the credit of being the first to —^ _ . evok _ — e — literary -- - — ____ ^ j enthusiasm _ ^^_ , M QV ixuJScotland ^^^^ TfVP *^ — — after - ^ . — _

    its long abeyance . When Ramsay died there were already in existence more than fifty other Scots who are memorable nowon-one ground

    or another , in the British Literary , History of the eighteenth century . Some of these , such

    as Armstrong , Smollett , M ckle , and Macp j herson— , mi _— grated ^ y , _ to _ Engf ~ j land , j as Arbuthnot ,

    as Thomson Reid , Camp , and bell Mallett , and had Beattie done , are ; others associated , such locally with Aberdeen _ _ ^_ _ Glasgow - or some -- rural ___

    part — — — — of , _ Scotlan __ d j . _ but , -j by far the , largest . __ . _ ^ proportion , like Allan Ramsay himself , had their

    homes in Edinburgh , or were essentially of Edinburgh celebrity by all their

    belongings—H K ^ $ m nry £ 8 , , D Dr avid . Hug -Hume h Blair , Monboddo , ' Dr . Thomas , Dr . Robert Blackm ., i , . .. . ' M

• Citation
  • Publishers’ Circular (1880-1890), Nov. 15, 1889, page 1481, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/pc/issues/tec_15111889/page/11/