Mickleham, July 15, 1850.

[Footnote 1: Salvino Salvini Fasti Consolari dell' Academia Fiorentina,
1717, p. 548. Milton's stay of two months at Florence must have been to
him a period of pure enjoyment, and seems to have been always remembered
with delight:--"Illa in urbe, quam prae ceteris propter elegantiam cum
linguæ tum ingeniorum semper colui, ad duos circiter menses substiti;
illie multorum et nobilium sanè et doctorum hominum familiaritatem
statim contraxi; quorum etiam privatas academias (qui mos illie cum ad
literas humaniores assiduè frequentavi). Tui enim Jacobe Gaddi, Carole
Dati, Frescobalde, Cultelline, Bonmatthaei, Chimentille Francine,
aliorumque plurium memoriam apud me semper gratam atque jucundam, nulla
dies delebit."--_Defensio Secunda_, p. 96., ed. 1698.]

* * * * *

PULTENEY'S BALLAD OF "THE HONEST JURY."

On the application for a new trial, in the case of The King _against_
William Davies Shipley, Dean of St. Asaph (1784), wherein was raised the
important and interesting question, whether in libel cases the jury were
judges of the law as well as the fact, Lord Mansfield, in giving
judgment, remarked in reference to trials for libel, before Lord
Raymond:

"I by accident (from memory only I speak now) recollect one
where the _Craftsman_ was acquitted; and I recollect it from a
famous, witty, and ingenious ballad that was made at the time by
Mr. Pulteney; and though it is a ballad, I will cite the stanza
I remember from it, because it will show you the idea of the