ver, in his public letter to Congress (unless Mr.
Jared Sparks has _improved_ this passage), says," &c.

"I know not whether my readers will concur with me in liking
Washington's own and though home-spun, excellent cloth, much
better than the 'Cobweb schemes and gauze coverings' which have,
it seems, been manufactured in its place."

A complete errata to Mr. Sparks's editions of Washington, Franklin, and
Gouverneur Morris, would occupy several volumes; and we do not remember
one instance in which his alterations were justifiable, or in which they
were really an improvement in point of style. The reprobation with which
Mr. Sparks has been visited by the learned and judicious of his own
country and England will be a warning to future laborers in the same
field. The works edited by Mr. Sparks are no longer, we believe, regarded
by historical students as of the slightest value as authorities, and no
faithfulness or excellence which may be displayed in future works from his
hand will retrieve his lost reputation.

These volumes will be reprinted immediately by the Appletons.

FAUST OF WITTENBERG AND FUST OF MENTZ.

It were well if writers on the origin of typography would obey the
injunction of Sir Thomas Browne, who thought it not inexpedient for those
who seek to enlighten mankind on any particular subject, first to acquire
some knowledge thereof themselves, so that the labor of readers should not
so generally be profitless. In an article by Bishop McIlvaine, and another
in Frazer's Magazine, by an anonymous contributor, the exercise of
_necromancy_ is imputed to Fust, the inventor or supposed inventor of
printing. Nine of every ten persons who write any thing on the subject
fall into the same error; they have something always to say of Fust and
the devil; curious anecdotes to rehearse of the multiplication of copies
of the Scriptures in Paris and elsewhere; spells and incantations by the
inventor of the "black" art to describe, &c. But this is all induced by
ignorance of the facts. John Fust, the putative inventor of printing, was
a shrewd silversmith, and we suspect a knavish one, for without having any
thing to do with the _invention_ of the "art preservative of arts," he
managed to rob another of the credit and profit of it. He was, however,
never in Paris; he was never in his lifetime accused of the exercise of
magical arts; he simply endeavored to make as much money as he could in