page obvious, so many times they invert
the sence), I referre to your discretion
(judicious gentle-men) whose lenity may
sooner supply them, then all my industry
can portray them.''

In _The Mastive, or Young Whelpe of
the Olde Dogge, Epigrams and Satyres
_(1615), an anonymous work of Henry
Peacham, we read:--

``The faultes escaped in the Printing
(or any other omission) are to be excused
by reason of the authors absence from the
Presse, who thereto should have given
more due instructions.''

Dr. Brinsley Nicholson brought forward
two very interesting passages on the
correcting of proofs from old plays. The
first, which looks very like an allusion to
the custom, is from the 1601 edition of
Ben Jonson's _Every Man in his Humour_
(act. ii., sc. 3), where Lorenzo, junior,
says, ``My father had the proving of your

copy, some houre before I saw it.'' The
second is from Fletcher's _The Nice Valour_
(1624 or 1625), act. iv., sc. 1. Lapet
says to his servant (the clown Goloshio),
``So bring me the last proof, this is