peare's play. This is
easily answered. In the first place, Katharine, the Shrew, is not a
"curst wife:" she becomes a wife, it is true, in the course of the
play; but this is a part of the process of taming her. But what
seems at once to disprove it is, that, according to Henslow's
account, Dekker was paid 10_l_. 10_s_. for the piece in
question; as Mr. Collier observes, an "unusually large sum" for a
new piece, and not likely to be paid for the bashing up of an old
one. I am thus left entirely without a clue, derivable from external
evidence, to the date of this play; and shall be glad to know if
there is any thing, throwing light upon the point, which I may have
overlooked. That more important consequences are involved in this
question than appear upon the face of it, I think I shall be able to
show in a future communication; and this is my excuse for
trespassing so much upon your space and your readers' patience.

SAMUEL HICKSON.

St. John's Wood, Jan. 26. 1850.

* * * * *

NOTES FROM FLY-LEAVES, NO. 6.

In a copy of Burnet's _Telluris Theoria Sacra_ (in Latin),
containing only the two first books (1 vol. 4to., Lond. 1689), there
is the following entry in Bishop Jebb's hand-writing:--

"From the internal evidence, not only of additional matter
in the margin of this copy, but of frequent erasures and
substitutions, I was led to suppose it was the author's copy,
illustrated by his own annotations and improvements. The
supposition is, perhaps, sufficiently corroborated by the
following extract from the _Biographia Britannica_,
vol. iii. p. 18.

"'It seems it was usual with Dr. Burnet, before he published
any thing in Latin, to have two or three copies, and no more,
printed off, which he kept by him for some time, in order to
revise at leisure what he had written _currente calamo_,
and sometimes, when he thought proper, to be communicated to
his particular friends for their opinions, &c.'

"This copy, as it does not differ from any of the editions of
1689, was certainly not one of those _proofs_. But the
Doctor's habit of annotating on his own Latin books after they
were printed, renders it extremely probable that this book was
a preparation for a new edition. It would be well to compare it
with the English translation."

The nature of many of the corrections and additions (which are very
numerous), evi