P.S.--It is really very annoying to have to reply to unhandsome and unjust
accusations. The REV. MR. ARROWSMITH first transposes two lines of
Shakspeare, and then, by notes of admiration, holds me up as a mere
simpleton; and then A. E. B. charges me with having pirated from him my
explanation of a passage in _Love's Labour's Lost_, Act V. Sc. 2. Let any
one compare his (in "N. & Q.," Vol. vi., p. 297.) with mine (Vol. vii., p.
136.), and he will see the utter falseness of the assertion. _He_ makes
_contents_ the nom. to _dies_, taken in its ordinary sense (rather an
unusual concord). _I_ take _dyes_ in the sense of tinges, imbues with, and
make it governed of _zeal_. But perhaps it is to the full-stop at
_presents_ that the "that's my thunder!" applies. I answer, that that was a
necessary consequence of the sense in which I had taken _dies_, and that
_their_ must then refer to _things_ maugre MR. ARROWSMITH. And when he says
that I "do him the honour of requoting the line with which he had supported
it," I merely observe that it is the line immediately following, and that I
have eyes and senses as well as A. E. B.
A. E. B. deceives himself, if he thinks that literary fame is to be
acquired in this way. I do not much approve either of the manner in which,
at least to my apprehension, in his opening paragraph, he seems to
insinuate a charge of forgery against MR. COLLIER. Finally, I can tell him
that he need not crow and clap his wings so much at his emendation of the
passage in _Lear_, for, if I mistake not, few indeed will receive it. It
may be nuts to him and MR. ARROWSMITH to know that they have succeeded in
driving my name out of the "N. & Q."
* * * * *