There is, in the British Museum, an interleaved copy of the first volume of the London edition of Thomson’s works, dated 1738, and the part of the volume which contains _The Seasons_ is full of manuscript deletions, corrections, and additions. These are in two handwritings, the one being unmistakably the handwriting of Thomson, the other beyond all question the handwriting of some one else. Almost all these corrections were inserted in the edition prepared for the press in 1744, and now, consequently, form part of the present text. The corrections in the hand which is not the hand of Thomson are, in many cases, of extraordinary merit, showing a fineness of ear and delicacy of touch quite above the reach of Thomson himself. We will give two or three samples. Thomson had written in _Autumn_ 290 seqq.:-- “With harvest shining all these fields are thine, And if my rustics may presume so far, Their master, too, who then indeed were blest To make the daughter of Acasto so.” The unknown corrector substitutes the present reading:-- “The fields, the master, all, my fair, are thine; If to the various blessings which thy house Has lavished on me thou wilt add that bliss, That dearest bliss, the power of blessing thee!” The other is famous. Thomson had written:-- “Thoughtless of beauty, she was beauty’s self, Recluse among the woods, if City-dames Will deign their faith. And thus she went compell’d By strong necessity, with as serene And pleased a look as patience can put on, To glean Palemon’s fields.” For these vapid and dissonant verses is substituted by the corrector, who very properly retains the first verse, what is now the text:-- “Recluse amid the close embow’ring woods, As in the hollow breast of Apennine, Beneath the shelter of encircling hills, A myrtle rises, far from human eyes, And breathes its balmy fragrance o’er the wild. So flourished blooming, and unseen by all, The sweet Lavinia,” etc. The transformation of a single line is often most felicitous: thus in _Winter_ the flat line “Through the lone night that bids the waves arise” is grandly altered into “Through the black night that sits immense around.” Thus, in _Spring_, Thomson had merely written “Whose aged oaks and venerable gloom Invite the noisy rooks;” but his corrector alters and extends the passage into “Whose aged elms and venerable oaks Invite the rooks, who high amid the boughs In early spring their airy city build, And caw with ceaseless clamour.”