PREFACE TO PORSONIANA. THE following anecdotes of Porson were communicated to me, in conversation, at various times, by the late Mr. William Maltby, - the school fellow, and, throughout life, the most confidential friend of Mr. Rogers. In his youth Mr. Maltby was entered at Cambridge, and resided there for some time: he, however, left the university without taking a degree. He afterwards practised as a solicitor in London. On the decease of Porson, he obtained an employment more suited to his tastes and habits than the profession of the law:-in 1809 he succeeded that celebrated man as Principal Librarian to the London Institution; and, during the long period of his holding the office, he greatly improved the library by the numerous judicious purchases which were made at his suggestion. In 1834 he was superannuated from all duty: but he still continued to occupy apartments in the Institu tion; and there he died, towards the close of his ninetieth year, January 5th, 1854. In Greek and Latin Mr. Maltby was what is called a fair scholar he was well read in Italian; his acquaintance with French and English literature was most extensive and accurate; in a knowledge of bibliography he has been surpassed by few: and the wonder was (as Mr. Rogers used frequently to observe) that, with all his devotion to study, and with all his admiration of the makers of books, he should never have come before the public in the character of an author. A. D. The following account of Porson's life (taken from Chambers's Encyclopædia, ed. 1880.) may not be considered as an inappropriate addition to this volume. "Richard Porson, the greatest Greek scholar England has ever produced, was born on Christmas, 1759, at East Ruston, Norfolk, where his father was parish clerk. The curate of the parish conceiving a liking for the boy, on account of his omnivorous appetite for books and his marvellous memory, took charge of him, and had him educated along with his own sons. Porson afterwards found a patron in Mr. Norris (the founder of the Norrisian professorship at Cambridge), who sent him to Eton in 1774, where he remained four years, but did not acquire any of the ordinary distinctions, although it is evident that it was there his mind acquired a fixed bias towards classical studies. Another patron, Sir George Baker, sent him, in 1778, to Trinity College, Cambridge, of which he was elected a scholar in 1780. Next year, he won the Craven Scholarship, and subsequently, the first Chancellor's medal. In 1782 he was chosen a Fellow of Trinity. It was about this time that he began to give indications of his subtle sagacity and taste in the difficult verbal criticisms of the Greek dramatists. For four years he contributed to Maty's Review-his first critique being on Schulz's Eschylus, and his finest on Brunck's Aristophanes. He also opened a correspondence with Professor Ruhnken. If, however, we are to judge from a quatrain written at a later period of his life, he did more than correspond: 'I went to Strasburg, where I got drunk With that more learned Professor Ruhnken.' "In 1787 appeared in the Gentleman's Magazine his sarcastic letters on Hawkins's Life of Johnson. For the same periodical, he also wrote his far more famous and trenchant Letters to Travis on the Three Witnesses. The dispute concerned the genuineness of John i.7, 8, and was occasioned by a blundering and pretentious defence of the passage by Archdeacon Travis, |