* * * * *
I beg to say that, in Peignot's _Dictionnaire raisonné de Bibliologie_,
the name of the printer Mertens is given as "Martens, Mertens, ou Martin
d'Alost (Thierry), en Latin Theodoricus Martinus." The article is too
long for insertion in your pages, but it contains an account of the
title-page of one of his editions, in 4to., in which the name is spelt
_Mertens_:--"Theo. Mertens impressore." Two other title-pages have "Apud
Theod. M_a_rtinum." So it appears that the printer himself used
different modes of spelling his own name. Erasmus wrote a Latin epitaph
on his friend, in which a graceful allusion is made to his printer's
mark, the anchor:--
"Hic Theodoricus jaceo, prognatus Alosto:
Ars erat impressis scripta referre typis.
Fratribus, uxori, soboli, notisque superstes
Octavam vegetus præterii decadem.
Anchora sacra manet, gratæ notissima pubi:
Christe! precor nunc sis anchora sacra mihi."