In Nicholls's _Literary Anecdotes of the Eighteenth Century_, vol. ii.
p. 495, 505, many curious particulars relating to this ceremony are to
be found.

As the custom has now for some time been discontinued, and the credulity
of those who believed in its efficacy, laughed at, I hope it will not be
long ere that disgusting custom of allowing persons (of whom women in
general form by far the greater number) afflicted with the king's evil,
and different other disorders, to come on the scaffold immediately after
the execution of a criminal, for the purpose of touching the part
affected, with the hand of the _but just dead_ malefactor, will be put a
stop to; it being the very height of absurdity to imagine that it can be
productive of any good effect; but on the contrary, tending to divest
the minds of the surrounding multitude of that awe with which the
ignominious spectacle should impress them.

[Greek: S.G.]

In the trifling paper I sent you respecting "Cats," which you deemed
worthy of insertion in No. 398, you have it "by some merchants from the
Island of Cyprus, who came hither for _fur_," it should be _tin_--Fur
being an article of importation.

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BOOKSELLERS' MARKS OR SIGNS.

(_For the Mirror_.)