oquiorum formulae_, models of colloquial
Latin conversation, written at Paris before 1500, for the use of his
pupils. Augustine Caminade, the shabby friend who was fond of living on
young Erasmus's genius, had collected them and had turned them to
advantage within a limited compass. He had long been dead when one
Lambert Hollonius of Liege sold the manuscript that he had got from
Caminade to Froben at Basle. Beatus Rhenanus, although then already
Erasmus's trusted friend, had it printed at once without the latter's
knowledge. That was in 1518. Erasmus was justly offended at it, the more
so as the book was full of slovenly blunders and solecisms. So he at
once prepared a better edition himself, published by Maertensz at
Louvain in 1519. At that time the work really contained but one true
dialogue, the nucleus of the later _Convivium profanum_. The rest were
formulae of etiquette and short talks. But already in this form it was,
apart from its usefulness to latinists, so full of happy wit and
humorous invention that it became very popular. Even before 1522 it had
appeared in twenty-five editions, mostly reprints, at Antwerp, Paris,
Strassburg, Cologne, Cracow, Deventer, Leipzig, London, Vienna, Mayence.

At Basle Erasmus himself revised an edition which was published in March
1522 by Froben, dedicated to the latter's six-year-old son, the author's
godchild, Johannes Erasmius Froben. Soon after he did more than revise.
In 1523 and 1524 first ten new dialogues, afterwards four, and again
six, were added to the _Formulae_, and at last in 1526 the title was
changed to _Familiarium colloquiorum opus_. It remained dedicated to the
boy Froben and went on growing with each new edition: a rich and motley
collection of dialogues, each a masterpiece of literary form, well-knit,
spontaneous, convincing, unsurpassed in lightness, vivacity and fluent
Latin; each one a finished one-act play. From that year on, the stream
of editions and translations flowed almost uninterruptedly for two
centuries.

Erasmus's mind had lost nothing of its acuteness and freshness when, so
many years after the _Moria_, he again set foot in the field of satire.
As to form, the _Colloquies_ are less confessedly satirical than the
_Moria_. With its telling subject, the _Praise of Folly_, the latter at
once introduces itself as a satire: whereas, at first sight, the
_Colloquies_ might seem to be mere innocent genre-pieces. But as to the
contents, they are more