imes
with his pen. In this volume we not only find the "remarkable _g_," the
tail of which is relied upon as a link in the chain of evidence to prove
the forgery of two documents, but yet another instance of the use of
dissimilar styles of writing by the same individual two hundred or two
hundred and fifty years ago, and also a well-preserved pencil memorandum
of the same period.[ii] But we have by no means disposed of all of this
question as to the pencil-writing, and we shall revert to it.

[Footnote hh: It probably records the price paid by the buyer of the
whole volume at second-hand in the first part of the century 1600.
The first memorandum is quite surely the price paid for the _Familiar
Epistles_ alone; for on the binding of the three books into one volume,
which took place at an early date, the tops of the capital letters of
this possessor's name were slightly cut down.]

[Footnote ii: Similar evidence must abound; and perhaps there is more
even within the reach of the writer of this article. For he has made
no particular search for it; but merely, after reading Dr. Ingleby's
_Complete View_, looked somewhat hastily through those of his old books
which, according to his recollection, contained old writing,--which, by
the way, has always recommended an antique volume to his attention.]

That the writing of the "Certificate of the Blackfriars Players," the
"Blackfriars Petition," and the marginal readings in Mr. Collier's folio
shows that they are by the same hand we cannot see. Their chirography is
alike, it is true, but it is not the same. Such likeness is often to
be seen. The capital letters are formed on different models; and the
variation in the _f-s, s-s, d-s_, and _y-s_ is very noticeable.

* * * * *

We now turn to another, and, to say the least, not inferior department
of the evidence in this complicated case. Mr. Hamilton has done yeoman's
service by his collation and publication of all the manuscript readings
found on the margins of "Hamlet" in Mr. Collier's folio. It is by far
the most important part of his "Inquiry." It fixes indelibly the stigma
of entire untrustworthiness upon Mr. Collier, by showing, that, when he
professed, after many examinations, to give a list of all the marginal
readings in that folio, he did not, in this play at least, give much
more than one-third of them, and that some of those which he omitted
were even more striking than those which he