2 On these German issues Hippe is full, but I have given
only what is needed to identify them.
[18]One of the strangest uses made of the narrative of Pine is to be
found in Schoeben's translation into German of Jan Mocquet's "Voyages en
Africque," etc., a work of some estimation which had already twice been
published in France and once in a Dutch translation before Schoeben
printed his edition in 1688. As pages inserted quite arbitrarily
in Mocquets compilation, Schoeben gave Pine's story in full, with a
paragraph of introduction which not a little abuses the truth while
giving an additional color of truth. He asserted that while kept at
Lisbon by the Dutch blockade, he was thrown much in the company of an
Englishman, one of the Pine family, who were all regarded as notable
seamen. From this man, then awaiting an opportunity to sail for the
West Indies, our author heard a very strange story of the origin of the
Pines, a story then quite notorious at Lisbon. Then follows, with some
embroidery, a version of the Neville pamphlet, which is not like any
German translation seen by me, but so full as to extend over ten pages
of the volume. It ends with a reiteration of the wholly false manner
in which this story had been obtained. So bold an appropriation of the
narrative, with a provenience entirely new and as fictitious as the
story itself, and its bodily inclusion by an editor in a work of
recognized merit, where it is between two true recitals, cannot be
defended.{1}
1 Mocquet's work originally appeared in Rouen in 1645, and a
Dutch translation was published at Dordrecht in 1656. A
second French issue, apparently unchanged in text, was put
out at Rouen in 1665, and in 1618 Schoeben's edition,
printed at Lûneberg by Johann Georg Lippers, preceded by
eight years an English translation made by Nathaniel Pullen.
The Pine tract appears, of course, only in Schoeben's
volume.
The tract passed to Cambridge, Massachusetts, before or early in
September, and it would indeed be interesting to know [19]how and
through whose hands it passed before reaching Marmaduke Johnson--to his
undoing. Hezekiah Usher was the only bookseller in Boston at the time,
and possibly his son, John, may have been associated with him. They
ordered what they desired from London booksellers and publishers, and
may have received voluntary consignments of publications from London.
That would be a somewhat precarious venture, for nothing could be more
different than the reading markets in Boston and in London, especially
in the lighter products of the press. Had it come through the Ushers,
the title-page might state that it had been printed "by M. J. for
Hezekiah Usher," but in that event Usher would have suffered for not
obtaining the needed license. The probability is that Johnson was alone
responsible and was tempted by the hope of gain.
These were all contemporary issues, coming from the press within six
months of the first appearance of the tract in London. So startling a
popularity, so widely shown, was a tribute to the opportunity rather
than to the contents of the piece. And the European interest continued
for a full century. In Germany it was included in a number of
collections of voyages, in Denmark it was printed in 1710 and 1789,
and in France Abbé Prévost took it for his compilation of 1767 on
discoveries. The English republication of 1778 has peculiar interest,
for it was due to no other than Thomas Hollis, the benefactor of the
library of Harvard College, who saw more in the tract than can now be
recognized, and induced Cadell to reprint it.
[20]