_John Bull_.--_Vertue MSS._--I always fancied that the familiar name
for our countrymen, about the origin of which "R.F.H." inquires (No.
21. p. 336.), was adopted from Swift's _History of John Bull_, first
printed in 1712; but I have no authority for saying so.

If the Vertue MSS. alluded to (No. 20. p. 319.) were ever returned by
Mr. Steevens to Dr. Rawlinson, they may be in the Bodleian Library, to
which the Doctor left all his collections, including a large mass of
papers purchased by him long after Pepys' death, as he described it,
"Thus et odores vendentibus."

These "_Pepys_ papers," as far as I can recollect, were very
voluminous, and relating to all sorts of subjects; but I saw them in
1824, and had only then time to examine and extract for publication
portions of the correspondence.

Braybrooke.

Audley End, March 25.


_Vertue's Manuscripts_.--The MS. quoted under this title by Malone
is printed entire, or rather all of it which refers to plays, by Mr.
Peter Cunningham, in the _Papers of the Shakspeare Society_, vol. ii.
p. 123., from an interleaved copy of Langbaine. Since the publication
of that paper, the entries relating to Shakspeare's plays have been
given from the original MS. in the Bodleian Library, in Halliwell's
_Life of Shakspeare_, p. 272.