400
NOTES AND QUERIES. [n s. vi. NOV. ie, 1912.
"Mystery" can never be unveiled, for we do not
think that too much stress should be laid on any
casual remark made by Dickens himself. That he
was not disposed to reveal the secret is shown by
the fact that Miss Hogarth told Madame Perugini
my book the Mystery, not the History, of Edwin
Drood," and that was all he would answer. " My
aunt could not make out from the reply, or from
his manner of giving it, whether he wished to con-
vey that the Mystery was to remain a mystery for
ever, or if he desired gently to remind her that he
would not disclose the secret until the proper time
arrived for telling it." The man most likely to be
in Dickens's confidence was Wilkie Collins, but he
knew nothing as to the end of the story, and,
although asked by Mr. Frederic Chapman to com-
plete it, declined.
All lovers of Dickens will be grateful to Sir Robertson Nicoll for his valuable contribution to this great literary controversy. Each page of his volume shows the untiring research and care he has bestowed upon it.
The Complete Poetical Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge, including Poems and Versions of Poems now Published for the First Tinie. Edited, with Textual and Bibliographical Notes, by Ernest Hartley Coleridge. 2 vols. (Frowde.)
WE have here a monumental piece of work which, we take it, will prove to be the definitive edition of Coleridge's poems. From MSS. in the British Museum and in the hands of private persons, and from the poet's note-books, a number of first drafts, metrical experiments, poems, and odd lines and fragments, which had hitherto remained unpublished, have here been brought together ; and with them we are given all the variant readings from the different former editions. The first draft of ' The Ancient Mariner ' is the most interesting of its kind ; and there are not a few of the metrical experiments worth studying, but in general it cannot be said of the matter here published for the first time that anything of importance has been added to what the world already possesses in the way of Coleridge's poetical work, and it might even with much show of reason be contended that a good propor- tion of it was hardly worth the trouble.
For the main text the editor has preferred that of 1834 to the 1829 text used by James Dykes Campbell in 1893, the former having been prepared by Coleridge himself with a view to republication, though by his death the choice of the poems and their arrangement, as well as the business of seeing them through the press, were thrown upon his editor, II. N. Coleridge. The Preface gives an exhaustive account of the divers editions that have hitherto appeared; and the foot-notes to the several poems, besides all the variant readings, supply copious information, largely of biblio- graphical interest, concerning date, occasion, and earlier publication.
Coleridge, as is well known, was a fastidious and laborious critic of his own work : tireless in the matter of amendment, and usually happy in the alterations he made. The study of his emendations is therefore peculiarly instructive,
and it is here rendered the easier and more illu-
minating by the chronological arrangement of
the poems, which enables one to trace not only
the rise and growth of his characteristic strange-
ness and charm, but also the ever-increasing
fineness and simplicity of his adaptation of means
to his end.
Calendar of Inquisitions post Mortem and other Analogous Documents preserved in the Public RecordOffice. Vol. III. Edward I. J (Stationery Office.)
THIS volume deals with the years 20 to 28 Ed- ward I., and contains a calendar of certain docu- ments selected from the Inquisitions post Mortem, the text having been prepared by one of the Assistant Record Keepers, Mr. J. E. E. S. Sharp, together with Mr. A. E. Stamp. It is, one need hardly say, a mine of interest, not only historical and antiquarian, but also human. Among the human documents a chief place must be given to the " proofs of age," of which there are several one Irish (the third made in Ireland, as a note informs us), and four of them proofs of age of heiresses. At Buxlowe, co. Suffolk, one of the witnesses to the age of John Cordeboef, proved 20 Oct., 25 Edw. I., was a Thomas Slene, aged 100 years, who " agrees and remembers it be- cause there was discord between John Fraunceys, father of the said John, and Reginald, then rector of the church of Buckeslowe at the time of the said John's birth, which was ended 23 years ago at the feast of St. Francis last, for which cause he was baptized at Preston and not at Buckeslowe." A large number of ancient English words here find illustration ; and there are many isolated incidents of great interest, such as a divorce by reason of consanguinity ; an appearance before the Chancellor at Lincoln to prove the sanity of a tenant alleged to be an idiot, who being examined was proved to be sane ; an example which brings out the law of inherit- ance in case of suicide ; to say nothing of the many curious and instructive particulars con- cerning " services." This is by no means the least valuable instalment of these uniquely valu- able publications.
to
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H. B. S. WOODHOCSE. Forwarded.
