‘Vitæ _volumine_ peracto Hic FINIS JACOBI TONSON[10] Perpoliti Sociorum Principis: Qui velut Obstretrix Musarum _In Lucem Edidit_ Felices Ingenii Partus. Lugete Scriptorum Chorus, Et Frangite Calamos! Ille vester _Margine Erasus deletur_, Sed hæc postrema Inscriptio Huic _Primæ_ Mortis _Paginæ_ Imprimatur, Ne _Prælo Sepulchri_ commissus Ipse _Editor careat Titulo_: Hic Jacet _Bibliopola_ _Folio_ vitæ delapso Expectans _novam Editionem_ Auctoriem et Emendatiorem.’ “And then, says Mr. Davis, the bet was awarded the Virginian. He referred to the ‘Gentleman’s Magazine’ for February, 1736, where the Latin inscription accredited to the Eton scholar, with a translation by a Mr. P----, was to be found. “After this second decision the Virginian declared that he would lay his boots against the New Englander’s that Franklin’s pretended discovery of calming troubled waters by pouring upon them oil might be found in the third book of Bede’s ‘History of the Church;’ or that his facetious essay on the air-bath is produced, word for word, from Aubrey’s ‘Miscellanies.’ But the New Englander, who had lost horse, saddle, and bridle, declined to run the risk on Dr. Franklin of going home without his boots.” * * * * * There are other instances of the philosopher’s palpable taking. To one, Franklin’s editor, Mr. Bigelow, adverts when he notes in Franklin’s letter of November 5, 1789, to Alexander Smith: “I find by your letter that every man has patience enough to hear calmly and coolly the injuries done to other people.” The marvellous precision and terseness of Swift--that keen, incisive melancholy wit of his from which great writers have taken ideas and phrases as gold-seekers have picked nuggets from California earth--Swift had more finely said what Franklin stumbled after when he wrote that he “never knew a man who could not bear the misfortunes of another like a Christian.”