LETTERXXX.
IT is so long since that I sent you the first part of my observations on Quarles that perhaps you have forgot my promise for the remainder.——I will now resume the subject.
Quarles sometimes introduces personages, and makes his poem of the dramatic cast. The sixth hieroglyphic is a dialogue betweenTimeandDeath; as usual, alluding to the print, whereDeathis going to extinguish the taper, but is prevented byTime. There are afew awkward expressions in this, which are easier to be overlooked than omitted.
Time.Death.Time.Behold the frailty of this slender snuff;Alas! it hath not long to last;Without the help of either thief or puff,Her weakness knows the way to waste:Nature hath made her substance apt enoughTo spend itself, and spend too fast:It needs the help of noneThat is so proneTo lavish out untouch’d, and languish all alone.Death.Time, hold thy peace, and shake thy slow-pac’d sand;Thine idle minutes make no way:Thy glass exceeds her hour, or else doth stand,I cannot hold, I cannot stay.Surcease thy pleading, and enlarge my hand,I surfeit with too long delay:This brisk this bold-fac’d lightDoth burn too bright;Darkness adorns my throne, my day is darkest night.Time.Great Prince of darkness! hold thy needless hand,Thy captive’s fast and cannot flee:What arm can rescue? who can countermand?What pow’r can set thy pris’ner free?Or if they could; what close, what foreign landCan hide that head that flees from thee?But if her harmless lightOffend thy sightWhat need’st thou snatch at noon, what must be thine at night?Death.I have outstaid my patience; my quick tradeGrows dull and makes too slow return:This long-liv’d debt is due, and should been paidWhen first her flame began to burn:But I have staid too long, I have delay’dTo store my vast, my craving urn.My patent gives me pow’rEach day, each hour,To strike the peasant’s thatch, and shake the princely tow’r.Time.Thou count’st too fast: thy patent gives no pow’rTill Time shall please to say, Amen.Death.Canst thou appoint my shaft?Time.Or thou my hour?Death.’Tis I bid, do.Time.’Tis I bid, when;Alas! thou canst not make the poorest flow’rTo hang the drooping head ’till then:Thy shafts can neither kill,Nor strike, untilMy power gives them wings, and pleasure arms thy will!
Time.Death.
Time.Death.
Time.Behold the frailty of this slender snuff;Alas! it hath not long to last;Without the help of either thief or puff,Her weakness knows the way to waste:Nature hath made her substance apt enoughTo spend itself, and spend too fast:It needs the help of noneThat is so proneTo lavish out untouch’d, and languish all alone.
Time.
Behold the frailty of this slender snuff;Alas! it hath not long to last;Without the help of either thief or puff,Her weakness knows the way to waste:Nature hath made her substance apt enoughTo spend itself, and spend too fast:It needs the help of noneThat is so proneTo lavish out untouch’d, and languish all alone.
Behold the frailty of this slender snuff;Alas! it hath not long to last;Without the help of either thief or puff,Her weakness knows the way to waste:Nature hath made her substance apt enoughTo spend itself, and spend too fast:It needs the help of noneThat is so proneTo lavish out untouch’d, and languish all alone.
Behold the frailty of this slender snuff;
Alas! it hath not long to last;
Without the help of either thief or puff,
Her weakness knows the way to waste:
Nature hath made her substance apt enough
To spend itself, and spend too fast:
It needs the help of none
That is so prone
To lavish out untouch’d, and languish all alone.
Death.Time, hold thy peace, and shake thy slow-pac’d sand;Thine idle minutes make no way:Thy glass exceeds her hour, or else doth stand,I cannot hold, I cannot stay.Surcease thy pleading, and enlarge my hand,I surfeit with too long delay:This brisk this bold-fac’d lightDoth burn too bright;Darkness adorns my throne, my day is darkest night.
Death.
Time, hold thy peace, and shake thy slow-pac’d sand;Thine idle minutes make no way:Thy glass exceeds her hour, or else doth stand,I cannot hold, I cannot stay.Surcease thy pleading, and enlarge my hand,I surfeit with too long delay:This brisk this bold-fac’d lightDoth burn too bright;Darkness adorns my throne, my day is darkest night.
Time, hold thy peace, and shake thy slow-pac’d sand;Thine idle minutes make no way:Thy glass exceeds her hour, or else doth stand,I cannot hold, I cannot stay.Surcease thy pleading, and enlarge my hand,I surfeit with too long delay:This brisk this bold-fac’d lightDoth burn too bright;Darkness adorns my throne, my day is darkest night.
Time, hold thy peace, and shake thy slow-pac’d sand;
Thine idle minutes make no way:
Thy glass exceeds her hour, or else doth stand,
I cannot hold, I cannot stay.
Surcease thy pleading, and enlarge my hand,
I surfeit with too long delay:
This brisk this bold-fac’d light
Doth burn too bright;
Darkness adorns my throne, my day is darkest night.
Time.Great Prince of darkness! hold thy needless hand,Thy captive’s fast and cannot flee:What arm can rescue? who can countermand?What pow’r can set thy pris’ner free?Or if they could; what close, what foreign landCan hide that head that flees from thee?But if her harmless lightOffend thy sightWhat need’st thou snatch at noon, what must be thine at night?
Time.
Great Prince of darkness! hold thy needless hand,Thy captive’s fast and cannot flee:What arm can rescue? who can countermand?What pow’r can set thy pris’ner free?Or if they could; what close, what foreign landCan hide that head that flees from thee?But if her harmless lightOffend thy sightWhat need’st thou snatch at noon, what must be thine at night?
Great Prince of darkness! hold thy needless hand,Thy captive’s fast and cannot flee:What arm can rescue? who can countermand?What pow’r can set thy pris’ner free?Or if they could; what close, what foreign landCan hide that head that flees from thee?But if her harmless lightOffend thy sightWhat need’st thou snatch at noon, what must be thine at night?
Great Prince of darkness! hold thy needless hand,
Thy captive’s fast and cannot flee:
What arm can rescue? who can countermand?
What pow’r can set thy pris’ner free?
Or if they could; what close, what foreign land
Can hide that head that flees from thee?
But if her harmless light
Offend thy sight
What need’st thou snatch at noon, what must be thine at night?
Death.I have outstaid my patience; my quick tradeGrows dull and makes too slow return:This long-liv’d debt is due, and should been paidWhen first her flame began to burn:But I have staid too long, I have delay’dTo store my vast, my craving urn.My patent gives me pow’rEach day, each hour,To strike the peasant’s thatch, and shake the princely tow’r.
Death.
I have outstaid my patience; my quick tradeGrows dull and makes too slow return:This long-liv’d debt is due, and should been paidWhen first her flame began to burn:But I have staid too long, I have delay’dTo store my vast, my craving urn.My patent gives me pow’rEach day, each hour,To strike the peasant’s thatch, and shake the princely tow’r.
I have outstaid my patience; my quick tradeGrows dull and makes too slow return:This long-liv’d debt is due, and should been paidWhen first her flame began to burn:But I have staid too long, I have delay’dTo store my vast, my craving urn.My patent gives me pow’rEach day, each hour,To strike the peasant’s thatch, and shake the princely tow’r.
I have outstaid my patience; my quick trade
Grows dull and makes too slow return:
This long-liv’d debt is due, and should been paid
When first her flame began to burn:
But I have staid too long, I have delay’d
To store my vast, my craving urn.
My patent gives me pow’r
Each day, each hour,
To strike the peasant’s thatch, and shake the princely tow’r.
Time.Thou count’st too fast: thy patent gives no pow’rTill Time shall please to say, Amen.
Time.
Thou count’st too fast: thy patent gives no pow’rTill Time shall please to say, Amen.
Thou count’st too fast: thy patent gives no pow’rTill Time shall please to say, Amen.
Thou count’st too fast: thy patent gives no pow’r
Till Time shall please to say, Amen.
Death.Canst thou appoint my shaft?
Death.
Canst thou appoint my shaft?
Canst thou appoint my shaft?
Canst thou appoint my shaft?
Time.Or thou my hour?
Time.
Or thou my hour?
Or thou my hour?
Or thou my hour?
Death.’Tis I bid, do.
Death.
’Tis I bid, do.
’Tis I bid, do.
’Tis I bid, do.
Time.’Tis I bid, when;Alas! thou canst not make the poorest flow’rTo hang the drooping head ’till then:Thy shafts can neither kill,Nor strike, untilMy power gives them wings, and pleasure arms thy will!
Time.
’Tis I bid, when;Alas! thou canst not make the poorest flow’rTo hang the drooping head ’till then:Thy shafts can neither kill,Nor strike, untilMy power gives them wings, and pleasure arms thy will!
’Tis I bid, when;Alas! thou canst not make the poorest flow’rTo hang the drooping head ’till then:Thy shafts can neither kill,Nor strike, untilMy power gives them wings, and pleasure arms thy will!
’Tis I bid, when;
Alas! thou canst not make the poorest flow’r
To hang the drooping head ’till then:
Thy shafts can neither kill,
Nor strike, until
My power gives them wings, and pleasure arms thy will!
There is nothing which destroys therealityin a dramatic dialogue more than when the speakers ask questions and reply in an equal quantity of lines. Perhaps the most disgusting instance of this is in Milton’s Mask, where Comus and the Lady have a verse each alternately, for fourteen lines together. We are more sensible of the sameness in quantity where it is so short, and so often repeated, than here in Quarles where it is extended to a stanza, and that repeated for each speaker but once—buteven here you begin to feel its bad effect, when it is finely relieved towards the end by the characters growing warmer in their dispute, and, of course, making their speeches shorter. Yet what I here condemn, others admire.——You, who are so fond of the ancients, may easily defend this practice by their example, and if you want any assistance to demolish me, may call in Mr. West and the author of the Origin and Progress of Language.—This passage of the former from his translation of the Iphigenia of Euripedes is quoted by the latter with great commendations——not indeed because the dialogue is in alternate verse, but for its being a fine imitation of the ancient trochaic measure.
Iph.Know’st thou what should now be ordered?Tho.’Tis thy office to prescribe.Iph.Let them bind in chains the strangers.Tho.Canst thou fear they should escape?Iph.Trust no Greek; Greece is perfidious.Tho.Slaves depart, and bind the Greeks.Iph.Having bound, conduct them hither, &c.
Iph.Know’st thou what should now be ordered?Tho.’Tis thy office to prescribe.Iph.Let them bind in chains the strangers.Tho.Canst thou fear they should escape?Iph.Trust no Greek; Greece is perfidious.Tho.Slaves depart, and bind the Greeks.Iph.Having bound, conduct them hither, &c.
Iph.Know’st thou what should now be ordered?Tho.’Tis thy office to prescribe.Iph.Let them bind in chains the strangers.Tho.Canst thou fear they should escape?Iph.Trust no Greek; Greece is perfidious.Tho.Slaves depart, and bind the Greeks.Iph.Having bound, conduct them hither, &c.
Iph.Know’st thou what should now be ordered?
Tho.’Tis thy office to prescribe.
Iph.Let them bind in chains the strangers.
Tho.Canst thou fear they should escape?
Iph.Trust no Greek; Greece is perfidious.
Tho.Slaves depart, and bind the Greeks.
Iph.Having bound, conduct them hither, &c.
It is true that here the reply wants one of having the same number of syllables as the question—but still the constant return of the same quantity for each speaker is disgusting to all unprejudiced ears. You will tell me that it is in the high gusto of the antique, and that the feet are trochaics—I can only reply, that hard words cannot convince me contrary to reason, and if a proper effect is not produced, it is of very little consequence to me whether the authority is brought from Greece or Siberia. Horace’soften-quotedPallida mors, &c. was perhaps never better translated than at the end of the fourth stanza.
The ninth hieroglyphic will put you in mind of the poems that are squeezed or stretched into the form of axes, altars, and wings——but if you will attend to the matter, and not the form, you will find it excellent——to write this properly requires some care.
BeholdHow short a spanWas long enough of oldTo measure out the life of man;In those well-temper’d days, his time was thenSurvey’d, cast up, and found but threescore years and ten!Alas!And what is that?They come, and slide, and pass,Before my pen can tell thee what.The posts of Time are swift, which having runTheir sev’n short stages o’er, their short-liv’d task is done.Our daysBegun, we lendTo sleep, to antick playsAnd toys, until the first stage end:12 waining moons, twice 5 times told, we giveTo unrecover’d loss: we rather breathe than live.We spendA ten years breathBefore we apprehendWhat ’tis to live, or fear a Death:Our childish dreams are fill’d with painted joysWhich please our sense awhile, and waking prove but toys!How vainHow wretched isPoor man, that doth remainA slave to such a state as this!His days are short, at longest; few at most;They are but bad at best; yet lavish’d out, or lost.They beThe secret springsThat make our minutes fleeOn wheels more swift than eagle’s wings!Our Life’s a clock, and ev’ry gasp of breathBreathes forth a warning grief, till Time shall strike a Death!How soonOur new-born lightAttains to full-ag’d noon!And this, how soon to grey-hair’d night!We spring, we bud, we blossom and we blastE’er we can count our days, our days they flee so fast!They endWhen scarce begun;And e’er we apprehendThat we begin to live, our life is done:Man count thy days; and if they fly too fastFor thy dull thoughts to count, count ev’ry day the last.
BeholdHow short a spanWas long enough of oldTo measure out the life of man;In those well-temper’d days, his time was thenSurvey’d, cast up, and found but threescore years and ten!
Alas!And what is that?They come, and slide, and pass,Before my pen can tell thee what.The posts of Time are swift, which having runTheir sev’n short stages o’er, their short-liv’d task is done.
Our daysBegun, we lendTo sleep, to antick playsAnd toys, until the first stage end:12 waining moons, twice 5 times told, we giveTo unrecover’d loss: we rather breathe than live.
We spendA ten years breathBefore we apprehendWhat ’tis to live, or fear a Death:Our childish dreams are fill’d with painted joysWhich please our sense awhile, and waking prove but toys!
How vainHow wretched isPoor man, that doth remainA slave to such a state as this!His days are short, at longest; few at most;They are but bad at best; yet lavish’d out, or lost.
They beThe secret springsThat make our minutes fleeOn wheels more swift than eagle’s wings!Our Life’s a clock, and ev’ry gasp of breathBreathes forth a warning grief, till Time shall strike a Death!
How soonOur new-born lightAttains to full-ag’d noon!And this, how soon to grey-hair’d night!We spring, we bud, we blossom and we blastE’er we can count our days, our days they flee so fast!
They endWhen scarce begun;And e’er we apprehendThat we begin to live, our life is done:Man count thy days; and if they fly too fastFor thy dull thoughts to count, count ev’ry day the last.
Methinks Quarles’s ghost is at my elbow, which will not be appeased unless I remark that the first lines of each stanza make a verse, being the text on which the poem is a comment.
Behold, alas! our days we spend;How vain they be, how soon they end!
Behold, alas! our days we spend;How vain they be, how soon they end!
Behold, alas! our days we spend;How vain they be, how soon they end!
Behold, alas! our days we spend;
How vain they be, how soon they end!
This is a kind of false wit once much in request. Jarvis, the translatorof Don Quixote, calls itglossing—upon what authority I know not. In the first chapter of the second book of the second volume may be found a text and gloss—with this difference from Quarles’s, that the text is introduced at the end of the stanza and not at the beginning.
It is impossible to avoid smiling at the pains he must have taken to preserve the form of the stanza—in the third he is obliged to have the assistance of figures, or his line would have been too long; and after all his trouble there must be some for the reader before he has calculated how much “12 moons, twice 5 times told,” are——in the rest, to say the truth, it is not so apparent. If this pyramidicalstanza prevents you from attending to the poetry, it is easily put in another—of the two first lines make one; and the false wit immediately vanishes.—I hope Quarles’s ghost vanished before I proposed the alteration.
I have, like a prudent caterer, reserved the best thing for the last. It is the twelfth emblem of the third book. The subject of the print is a figure trying to escape from the Divine vengeance which is pursuing in thunders: the motto——O that thou wouldst hide me in the grave, that thou wouldst keep me in secret until thy wrath be past!Upon this hint he has produced the following excellent poem.
Ah! whither shall I fly? what path untrodShall I seek out to ’scape the flaming rodOf my offended, of my angry God?Where shall I sojourn? what kind sea will hideMy head from thunder? where shall I abide,Until his flames be quench’d or laid aside?What, if my feet should take their hasty flight,And seek protection in the shades of night?Alas! no shades can blind the God of light.What, if my soul should take the wings of day,And find some desert? if she spring awayThe wings of vengeance clip as fast as they.What, if some solid rock should entertainMy frighted soul? can solid rocks restrainThe stroke of Justice and not cleave in twain?Nor sea, nor shade, nor shield, nor rock, nor cave,Nor silent deserts, nor the sullen grave,Where flame-ey’d fury means to smite, can save.Tis vain to flee; ’till gentle mercy shewHer better eye; the farther off we go,The swing of Justice deals the mightier blow.Th’ ingenuous child, corrected, doth not flieHis angry mother’s hand, but clings more nigh,And quenches with his tears her flaming eye.Great God! there is no safety here below;Thou art my fortress, thou that seem’st my foe,’Tis thou that strik’st the stroke, must guard the blow.
Ah! whither shall I fly? what path untrodShall I seek out to ’scape the flaming rodOf my offended, of my angry God?Where shall I sojourn? what kind sea will hideMy head from thunder? where shall I abide,Until his flames be quench’d or laid aside?What, if my feet should take their hasty flight,And seek protection in the shades of night?Alas! no shades can blind the God of light.What, if my soul should take the wings of day,And find some desert? if she spring awayThe wings of vengeance clip as fast as they.What, if some solid rock should entertainMy frighted soul? can solid rocks restrainThe stroke of Justice and not cleave in twain?Nor sea, nor shade, nor shield, nor rock, nor cave,Nor silent deserts, nor the sullen grave,Where flame-ey’d fury means to smite, can save.Tis vain to flee; ’till gentle mercy shewHer better eye; the farther off we go,The swing of Justice deals the mightier blow.Th’ ingenuous child, corrected, doth not flieHis angry mother’s hand, but clings more nigh,And quenches with his tears her flaming eye.Great God! there is no safety here below;Thou art my fortress, thou that seem’st my foe,’Tis thou that strik’st the stroke, must guard the blow.
Ah! whither shall I fly? what path untrodShall I seek out to ’scape the flaming rodOf my offended, of my angry God?
Ah! whither shall I fly? what path untrod
Shall I seek out to ’scape the flaming rod
Of my offended, of my angry God?
Where shall I sojourn? what kind sea will hideMy head from thunder? where shall I abide,Until his flames be quench’d or laid aside?
Where shall I sojourn? what kind sea will hide
My head from thunder? where shall I abide,
Until his flames be quench’d or laid aside?
What, if my feet should take their hasty flight,And seek protection in the shades of night?Alas! no shades can blind the God of light.
What, if my feet should take their hasty flight,
And seek protection in the shades of night?
Alas! no shades can blind the God of light.
What, if my soul should take the wings of day,And find some desert? if she spring awayThe wings of vengeance clip as fast as they.
What, if my soul should take the wings of day,
And find some desert? if she spring away
The wings of vengeance clip as fast as they.
What, if some solid rock should entertainMy frighted soul? can solid rocks restrainThe stroke of Justice and not cleave in twain?
What, if some solid rock should entertain
My frighted soul? can solid rocks restrain
The stroke of Justice and not cleave in twain?
Nor sea, nor shade, nor shield, nor rock, nor cave,Nor silent deserts, nor the sullen grave,Where flame-ey’d fury means to smite, can save.
Nor sea, nor shade, nor shield, nor rock, nor cave,
Nor silent deserts, nor the sullen grave,
Where flame-ey’d fury means to smite, can save.
Tis vain to flee; ’till gentle mercy shewHer better eye; the farther off we go,The swing of Justice deals the mightier blow.
Tis vain to flee; ’till gentle mercy shew
Her better eye; the farther off we go,
The swing of Justice deals the mightier blow.
Th’ ingenuous child, corrected, doth not flieHis angry mother’s hand, but clings more nigh,And quenches with his tears her flaming eye.
Th’ ingenuous child, corrected, doth not flie
His angry mother’s hand, but clings more nigh,
And quenches with his tears her flaming eye.
Great God! there is no safety here below;Thou art my fortress, thou that seem’st my foe,’Tis thou that strik’st the stroke, must guard the blow.
Great God! there is no safety here below;
Thou art my fortress, thou that seem’st my foe,
’Tis thou that strik’st the stroke, must guard the blow.
Six stanzas, which though very good, yet being of less merit than the rest are omitted. It is obvious that he had the 139th psalm in his eye, of which he has made great use. The alarm at the beginning—the searching all nature for shelter—the impossibility of being hid from the author of nature—and the acquiescing at last in what was unavoidable, are grand and natural ideas. The motion of the wings of vengeance—and the recapitulation of the places where protection was fought in vain—are instancesof expression rarely met with. But what praise is sufficient for the simile in the eighth stanza? To say only that it is apposite and beautiful, comes very short of my sensations when I read it. Let me confess honestly that I think it one of the noblest instances of the sublime pathetic! As a part of a religious poem it is proper, in a high degree; the scripture frequently considering our connection with the Almighty as that of children with a parent.—As a pictoresque image it is distinct, natural, and affecting.—But to remark all the beauties of this poem would be to comment on every stanza.——You will have more pleasure in finding them out yourself.
Now what think you, is not this rather too good to be lost? Was it from never reading Quarles, or taking his character from common report, that Pope considered his productions as the very bathos of poetry? Poor Quarles! thou hast had many enemies, and art now forgotten. But thou hast at last found a friend—not equal, indeed, to the task of turning a tide that has been flowing for a hundred years against thee—not equal to his wishes for giving thee and every neglected genius his due share of reputation—but barely capable of laying the first stone of thy temple of fame, which he leaves to be compleated by abler and by stronger hands!
Farewel.
P. S. I had forgot to inform you that these emblems were imitated in Latin by one Herman Hugo, a Jesuit. The first edition of them was in 1623, soon after the appearance of Quarles; and the book was reprinted for the ninth time in 1676, which last is the date of the copy in my possession. How many more editions there have been, I know not. He makes no acknowledgement to Quarles, and speaks of his own work as original. As a specimen of his manner, take the following, which is intended as an imitation of “Ah whither shall I fly?”
Quis mihi securis dabit hospita tecta latebris?Tecta, quibus dextræ server ab igne tuæ?Heu! tuus ante oculos quoties furor ille recursat,Nulla mihi toties fida sat antra reor.Tunc ego secretas, umbracula frondea, sylvas,Lustràque solivagis opto relicta feris.Tunc ego vel mediis timidum caput abdere terris,Aut maris exesâ condere rupe velim, &c.
Quis mihi securis dabit hospita tecta latebris?Tecta, quibus dextræ server ab igne tuæ?Heu! tuus ante oculos quoties furor ille recursat,Nulla mihi toties fida sat antra reor.Tunc ego secretas, umbracula frondea, sylvas,Lustràque solivagis opto relicta feris.Tunc ego vel mediis timidum caput abdere terris,Aut maris exesâ condere rupe velim, &c.
Quis mihi securis dabit hospita tecta latebris?Tecta, quibus dextræ server ab igne tuæ?Heu! tuus ante oculos quoties furor ille recursat,Nulla mihi toties fida sat antra reor.
Quis mihi securis dabit hospita tecta latebris?
Tecta, quibus dextræ server ab igne tuæ?
Heu! tuus ante oculos quoties furor ille recursat,
Nulla mihi toties fida sat antra reor.
Tunc ego secretas, umbracula frondea, sylvas,Lustràque solivagis opto relicta feris.Tunc ego vel mediis timidum caput abdere terris,Aut maris exesâ condere rupe velim, &c.
Tunc ego secretas, umbracula frondea, sylvas,
Lustràque solivagis opto relicta feris.
Tunc ego vel mediis timidum caput abdere terris,
Aut maris exesâ condere rupe velim, &c.
It reads but poorly after the other, though I have given you the best of it. He afterwards by degrees quits his subject, runs into stuff about Cain and Jonah, and has entirely omitted the simile.
You express an inclination to publish my letters. You should consider that the date of some of them is so far back, that many allusions to passing incidents which might engage attention at the time, now must fail of their effect.——People are spoken of as living, who are dead——and many other objections might be enumerated.However, you are at liberty to do what you please with them. Those which are of a private nature, your prudence will, of course, keep to yourself: and for the others, where some conjectures are hazarded which may be thought different from received opinions; the writer wishes them to be read with the same impartiality they were written——though he is well apprized of the difficulty of dispossessing old opinions.
FINIS.
Transcriber’s Notes:Blank pages have been removed.Silently corrected typographical errors.Spelling and hyphenation variations made consistent.Page 87, end of letter XXVII: The symbol appears to be U+1FDE Greek Dasia (rough breathing diacritical mark for an ‘h’ sound before a vowel) and Oxia (acute accent).Formatting of a dialogue in letter XXX made more consistent.
Transcriber’s Notes:
Blank pages have been removed.
Silently corrected typographical errors.
Spelling and hyphenation variations made consistent.
Page 87, end of letter XXVII: The symbol appears to be U+1FDE Greek Dasia (rough breathing diacritical mark for an ‘h’ sound before a vowel) and Oxia (acute accent).
Formatting of a dialogue in letter XXX made more consistent.