of the first leaf, and his signature appended in full. It was with the copy so licensed that Milton went to his publisher.
The publisher was Samuel Symons, or Simmons, printer, whose place of business was "next door to the Golden Lion in Aldersgate Street." He seems to have been the son or other near relative, and the successor in business, of a Matthew Simmons, who had been much employed in official printing for the Commonwealth Government, and with whom in that way Milton, during his Latin Secretaryship to that Government, had had frequent dealings. Milton's Eikonoklastes of 1648–9 had been published by this Matthew Simmons; and so, though there were not a few other publishers in London that had published for Milton at various times, it may have been more than chance that led Milton to Samuel Simmons with his Paradise Lost. One may see now in the British Museum the original agreement between them, of date April 27, 1667, as kept by Simmons, with Milton's seal attached, and his signature "John Milton," written for him by proxy, and witnessed by a "John Fisher" and by "Benjamin Greene, servant to Mr. Milton." In substance it was as follows:—For £5 then paid down to Milton he handed over the licensed manuscript to Simmons, with the stipulation that he was to receive another £5 when the first "impression," or edition, of the printed book should be sold off, a third £5 when the second "impression" should be sold off, and a fourth £5 when the third "impression" should be sold off—each "impression," or edition, to be counted as 1,300 copies, "retailed off to particular reading customers," though (to leave a margin for presentation copies) Simmons might print 1,500. Altogether, if we convert the money of that time into its present equivalent, it was as if an author now were to receive £17 10s. for the right to print, with a guarantee of the same sum at the end of the first edition, the same at the end of the second, and the same at the end of the third, each edition to consist of 1,300 copies. As nothing was said of any edition beyond the third, Milton may be supposed to have looked forward at the utmost to a sale of 3,900 copies, out of 4,500 that might be printed, and to have parted with his
