"O you leaden messengers, That ride upon the violent speed of fire, Fly with false aim; move the still-peering air, That sings with piercing, do not touch my lord!" Such is the text of the first folio. MR. PAYNE COLLIER, at p. 162. of his _Notes and Emendations_, informs us that the old corrector of his folio of 1632 reads _volant_ for "violent," _wound_ for "move," and _still-piecing_ for "still-peering." Two of these substitutions are easily shown to be correct. In the _Tempest_, Act III. Sc. 3., we read: "The elements, Of whom your swords are tempered, may as well _Wound the loud winds, or with bemockt-at stabs_ _Kill the still-closing waters_." What is _still-closing_ but _still-piecing_, the silent reunion after severance? What is to _wound the loud winds_ but to _wound the air that sings with piercing_? But as to the third substitution, I beg permission through your pages to enter a _caveat_. If {427} we had no proof from the text of Shakspeare that _violent_ is the correct reading, I fancy that any reader's common sense would tell him that it is more an appropriate and trenchant term than _volant_. "What judgment would _stoop_ from this to this?" _Volant_, moreover, is not English, but French, and as such is used in _Henry V._; but happily, in this case, we have most abundant evidence from the text of Shakspeare that he wrote _violent_ in the above passage. In _Henry VIII._, Act I. Sc. 1., we have the passage, "We may outrun, By _violent swiftness_, that which we run at, And lose by over-running." In _Othello_, Act III. Sc. 3., we have the passage, "Even so my bloody thoughts, with _violent pace_, Shall ne'er look back." These passages prove that _violent_ is a true Shakspearian epithet for _velocity_. But how exquisitely appropriate is the epithet when applied to the velocity of a ball issuing from the mouth of a cannon: and here we have full confirmation from _Romeo and Juliet_, Act V. Sc. 1., where we read: "As _violently_ as hasty powder fir'd Doth hurry from the fatal cannon's womb." I trust that MR. COLLIER will not, in the teeth of such evidence, substitute _volant_ for _violent_ in correcting the text of his forthcoming edition. C. MANSFIELD INGLEBY. Birmingham. * * * * * GENERAL MONK AND THE UNIVERSITY OF CAMBRIDGE.