Notes and Queries, Number 04, November 24, 1849 | Page 3

latinam, ita ut ex omni Christi collegio vix inveniretur unus in milleno hominum genere, qui salutatorias fratri posset rationabiliter dirigere litteras."
So that although Mabillon says that scarce one in a thousand could address a Latin letter to another, yet he by no means says that it was on account of their general ignorance, but because they were addicting themselves to other branches of learning. They were devoting all their energies to Arabic and Chald?an science, and in their pursuit of it neglected other literature. A similar remark might be made of respecting many distinguished members of the University to which I belong; yet who would feel himself justified in inferring thence that Cambridge was sunk in ignorance?
CANTAB.
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ADVERSARIA
[In our Prospectus we spoke of NOTES AND QUERIES becoming everybody's common-place book. The following very friendly letter from an unknown correspondent, G.J.K., urges us to carry out such an arrangement.
"Sir,--I beg leave to forward you a contribution for your 'NOTES AND QUERIES,' a periodical which is, I conceive, likely to do a vast deal of good by bringing literary men of all shades of opinion into closer juxtaposition than they have hitherto been.
"I would, however, suggest that in future numbers a space might be allotted for the reception of those articles (short of course), which students and literary men in general, transfer to their common-place books; such as notices of scarce or curious books, biographical or historical curiosities, remarks on ancient or obsolete customs, &c. &c. &c. Literary men are constantly meeting with such in the course of their reading, and how much better would it be if, instead of transferring them to a MS. book to be seen only by themselves, or perhaps a friend or two, they would forward them to a periodical, in which they might be enshrined in imperishable pica; to say nothing of the benefits such a course of proceeding would confer on those who might not have had the same facilities of gaining the information thus made public.
"In pursuance of this suggestion, I have forwarded the inclosed paper, and should be happy, from time to time, to contribute such gleanings from old authors, &c. as I might think worth preserving.
"G.J.K."
We readily comply with G.J.K.'s suggestion, and print, as the first of the series, his interesting communication, entitled:]
1. _Writers of Notes on Fly-leaves, &c._
The Barberini Library at Rome contains a vast number of books covered with marginal notes by celebrated writers, such as Scaliger, Allatius, Holstentius, David Haeschel, Barbadori, and above all, Tasso, who has annotated with his own hand more than fifty volumes. Valery, in his _Voyages en Italie_, states that a Latin version of Plato is not only annotated by the hand of Tasso, but also by his father, Bernardo; a fact which sufficiently proves how deeply the language and philosophy of the Greek writers were studied in the family. The remarks upon the _Divina Commedia_, which, despite the opinion of Serassi, appear to be authentic, attest the profound study which, from his youth, Tasso had made of the great poets, and the lively admiration he displayed for their works. There is also in existence a copy of the Venice edition of the Divina Commedia (1477), with autograph notes by Bembo.
Christina of Sweden had quite a mania for writing in her books. In the library of the Roman College (at Rome) there are several books annotated by her, amongst others a {52} Quintus Curtius, in which, as it would appear, she criticises very freely the conduct of Alexander. "_He reasons falsely in this case_," she writes on one page; and elsewhere, "_I should have acted diametrically opposite; I should have pardoned_;" and again, further on, "_I should have exercised clemency_;" an assertion, however, we may be permitted to doubt, when we consider what sort of clemency was exercised towards Monaldeschi. Upon the fly-leaf of a Seneca (Elzevir), she has written, "_Adversus virtutem possunt calamitates damna et injuri? quod adversus solem nebul? possunt_." The library of the Convent of the Holy Cross of Jerusalem at Rome, possesses a copy of the _Bibliotheca Hispanu_, in the first volume of which the same princess has written on the subject of a book relating to her conversion: [1] "_Chi l'ha scritta, non lo sa; chi lo sa, non l'ha mai scritta_."
Lemontey has published some very curious _Memoirs_, which had been entirely written on the fly-leaves and margins of a missal by J. de Coligny, who died in 1686.
Racine, the French tragic poet, was also a great annotator of his books; the Biblioth��que National at Paris possesses a Euripides and Aristophanes from his library, the margins of which are covered with notes in Greek, Latin, and French.
The books which formerly belonged to La Monnoie are now recognizable by the anagram of his name. _A Delio nomen_, and