Whence is thy learning? Hath thy toil
O'er books consumed the midnight oil?--J. GAY.
P. 171. _Wilson._--This is often taken to be an antique. As a matter of
fact, Mr. John Wilson, a London bookseller, stated to Mr. Austin Dobson
that he wrote the lines as a motto for one of his second-hand
catalogues. Wilson, Mr. Dobson tells us, was amused at the vogue the
lines eventually obtained.
P. 172. _Chaucer._--This is the earlier version, and to be preferred to
the later, in which the passage ends:
Farwel my book and my devocioun!
wel unethe=scarcely any.