852
NOTES AND QUERIES. [12 s. in. JULY, 1917.
Cossid, but the peon that went to muxu-
davad* where they are made forgot to order
the fellow to make them lesse, So that he has
[bro]ught me 2 pr: of the Same bignesse as
those Sent you, but I have now given him a
measure, and beleive may have Some ready
against next conveighance and Shall not
fayle to send them.
The Cott Strings for Mr nurse have this morning bespoke, and the fellow Promises to get them ready in 10 days time. You mention nothing as to their colours So have ordered him to make 1 pr: red and 1 pr: Skie colour.
I omitted to write per last Cossid by reason of the many biles that then tormented me. By the Same conveighance there went one to you from Mr Marshall.
[Unsigned]
[Endorsed] To Mr Vickers Augst. 18th: 1670.
LETTER LIU.
John Smith to Richard Edwards. (O.C. 3463.)
Decca August 23d 1670
Mr Richard Edwards
Esteem'd freind. Yours by Mer- chants Cosset f received longe since and should have answer'd it more Speedily had an opportunity presented. I humbly thank You for Your news and for your kind offer of an English Lady. My confidence in you is great, Yet not soe as I can trust You to chuse a wife for mee when You are unpro- vided Your Selfe, which want pray first Supply, and if there's none left for mee I'm content to Stay till another Spring. By next conveighance shall send Your AddatiesJ and flower'd Jelolsies, which is all at present save the Kind Respects of
Your very Loving freind
JOHN SMITH
Mr Jones presents his kind Respects to you etca.
J: S: [Endorsed] To Mr Richard Edwards
Merchant In Cassumbuzar
R. C. TEMPLE. (To be continued.)
- Muxudavad, for Maksudabad, an early name
for Murshidabad.
t This letter is missing. $ See Letter XXXIII.
COCKER'S ' ARITHMETIC ': THE FIRST
EDITION.
THAT the name of Cocker, the author of the celebrated treatise on arithmetic, has sur- vived to the present day is largely owing to the proverbial saying " According to Cocker." This phrase originally, and more accurately, was " Correct according to Cocker," and in its abbreviated form has acquired general currency wherever the English language is spoken.
Edward Cocker, who was born in 1631 and died 1675, is described as a " scrivener and engraver," and in 1664 started near St. Paul's a public school for writing and arithmetic, which he is said to have taught " in an extraordinary manner." He is credited by the writer of the article in the ' D.N.B.' with the authorship of no fewer than thirty- three publications, many of which went through several editions.
These are classified under three heads : (1) Calligraphic, Nos. 1-23 ; (2) Arithmetical Nos. 24-29 ; (3) Miscellaneous, Nos. 30-33, Of these (No. 14) 'The Tutor to Writing and Arithmetick : Part I. Calligraphic : Part II. Arithmetical,' issued in 1664, was the first dealing with arithmetic.
After his death there was published" (No. 26) :
" Cocker's Arithmetick, being a Plain and Easy Method. . . . composed by Edward Cocker. . . . Perused and published by John Hawkins, Writing Master.... by the Author's Correct Copy, 1078."
By 1756 fifty editions of this work had appeared, and it is computed that probably at least 112 editions of it have been pub- lished.
The first edition of the ' Arithmetick/ which, as stated above, was published in 1664, is extremely rare. Quaritch, in one of his catalogues, says :
" Few pereons who quote the proverb ' Correct according to Cocker ' have ever seen the book that has rendered the author's name a household word, although there are upwards of sixty editions of it, and of those few, probably not half-a-dozen, have seen a copy printed before 1670."
For many years it was very doubtful if any copy of the first edition remained ini existence, it being supposed that its use itt schools had utterly extirpated any vestige of it. Lowndes had never seen a copy of the ' Decimal Arithmetic,' which he dates " probably 1669 " (a printer's error for 1689), adding " but no copy known." This was really published in 1684, 1685.
Through the kindness of a well-known. Glasgow bibliophile I have now had the-
