The daily dispatch. [volume] (Richmond [Va.]) 1850-1884, 1859-09-06

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celiter,s shakspeare.
.,.stor az the Nsses seems 70 have |
o the drift Of our remarks reia- |
... ~ ~. ,.,s experiments upon CoLIiRR's |
..,.,. - ,f,a MADE In the London Mssesm.--
w. A. not believe, and never have for mo. |
msnt believed, that COLLIER himself was
ru,,sy OF the forgery, II, indeed, there DO any
sarrery In the eascN No man has charged him
with IL. a. far As wehave been able to learn
On the contrary. all the writers npon the sub
,e.t sseru to confine tho idea Of forgery to the
corrections themselves, none Of them impli-
Gazing the man who gave them TO the public
For our own part, we do not believe that
there il any forgery in the casc-that is to say,
vs are confident that the man, or men, who
made the corrections, had access TO sources OF
in formation, which were not accessible TO any
OF t..e fnnumerab.e commentators who have
pubiished editions OF SHAKspEARE- Moral
conviction 10 decidedly In favor OF the au-
theu,ici.y; positive evidence we hold to be
strongly against 1t.
Let ux endsayor to state the case after the
msnnsr of our neighbor's profession. We
viii suppose that some London printer has
charged Mr.. COLLIER with forgery; that Mr..
G. in advised by counsel that the words used
In the publication are actionabie that he sues
the printer for false, scandaious and mali
cious libel, that the printer justiies, and that
the case comes on for trial before Judge ca
pablo alike Of weighing evidence and appre-
ciatinr SnAKspRARE, and a jury Of twelve
enlightened, educated, Intelligent, impartial
men. familiar with the writings Of the author
himself and Of the commentator who's plain
tiff in the action. All the evidence has been
heard, by the consent Of parties and the per-
mission Of the Judge, much having been intro
duced. which could not have found It's way
into court under the strict rule Of the law
The Judge. we take t, would instruct the jury
somewhat after the following fashion:
The case before you, gentlemen OF the jury,
has been examined and argued with an eiabo-
ra.sness OF detail altogether without example.
1t stands, conceive, as follows: The plan
tilt in this &C ton, gentleman long and well
knowa to the public, as an editor OF SHAKs-
raAREs works, proves that sometime In jan
uars, is4a, he purchased, at certain book
rtore In this city. the folio edition of SBAKs-
Y.ArY's plays which IL now in your posses
sion 1t does not appear, from the small price
which he paid for 1t, that he suspected 1t to
h the treasure which it has since proved to
be, and indeed you have his declaration to
that effect, made long before he could have
had the slightest suspicion that any contro-
vsrsy would arise out of the transaction,
through The public prints OF London. In 1851
he announced TO the public that he had in his
possession copy of the folio edition OF
SHAKsrRARn's playslof 1882, being the same
which is now before you. He further stated
that there were upon the margin of the book
about eO,UOo manuscript corrections of passa-
yes in the text, written in a hand almost as
old 40 the book itself. That This statement
was no more than the truth, as far as ii was
possible for anybody to ascertain the truth
without subjeciing the hand writing to a
chemical analysis, You can easily perceive by
comparing the said hand writing with that Of
other documents which are also in your pos
session, and which are beyond all doubt or
question Of the period of 1882. The hand
writings and the inks both appear to belong to
the same period-the latter, in both instances,
presenting tawney, brown appearance, well
known To be characteristic ofall ancient Mss
You have the evidence. also, of clerks ana an
tiauaries, men Of great skill and large expert
ence all OF whom tell you that had Inc idea
Of forgery never been suggested, they should
At once and without hesitation, have assigned
these manuscript corrections TO the period al
which the book wasp .ished-that is, to 1862.
Pri,na fneie, every body, am convinced, would
arrive at the same conclusion, from mere in
spection And this brings us to a circumstance
which constitutes the q! of this action
The folio in question, by what means it is
mot necessary to state, having found its way
into the British Museum, was. by the keeper
of the manuscripts in that institution, sub
iected to severe scrutiny with powerful
microscope. the consequence Of which was the
discovery, in several instances, OF writing III
pencil, showing itself outside of the writing
in ink. Believing that black lead pencils were
not in use in the early part OF the 18th CEN
tury. he concluded that the writing in ink
could not be that old, since 1t was evidently
done after and upon the writing in pencil
Hence he inferred that whatever had been
the intention Of Mr.. COLLIER, the plaintiff in
this suit. there could be no doubt that what
amounted to fraud had been practised upon
the public, IN palming of writings Of q date
certainly not older than the commencement of
the present century, for a MS. of two centu
ries ago When the result of his investigations
was laid before. the public by the keeper of the
MS. Mr. COLLIER, under his own name, in an
article addressed to the editor Of the London
TSmss, indignantly denied the existence of any
pencil marks, except a few made by himself
and totally irrelevant--upon the face of the
book while il was in his possession. His hon.
eety having been thus openly impeached, the
Keeper called celebrated chemist to his aid
and having frgt obtained the owners leave, the
two proceeded to examine the MS. with great
severity. According to the statement of the
chemist wha, appeared to be very ancient ink
ink rendered brown by age-turned out to be
nothing more than tawney -colored pigment,
which readily came off when the spot it occu-
pied was sponged, aud left the pencil marks
plainly exposed TO view. 1t will be incum-
bent on you to find whether it may not be
possible 10 wash off ancient ink from an old
MS, and whether the marks of the pen may
not be sufficiently distinct, after the erasure
Of the ink, TO resemble pencil marks; and if it
shall prove to be SO, then you will see that the
Inference founded upon the presence Of the
supposed pencil marks is entirely unsustained.
II 10 hardly necessary to observe, that this
MS. having been in the hands Of many per-
sons Decides the plaintiff, even if it were
proved beyond the possibility of a doubt that
the corrections were forged, it does not follow
that the plaintiff must necessarily have been
guilty Of the forgery.
Against such a presumption, everything
that has occurred in the case Is direct and
positive The character of the plaintiff. his
associations, and the extreme imrrobabilitv
that 0A In ma hv
much disposed, OF executing such a forgery
al epeAk In his favor Literary nan.ia.s -