Oaths of Allegiance in Colonial New England — John Shaqi
Oaths of Allegiance in Colonial New EnglandEvans, Charles
History
Oaths of Allegiance in Colonial New England
Evans, Charles
Oaths; United States -- History -- Colonial period, ca. 1600-1775 -- Sources
Before calling upon him I sought as an introducer Henry N. Stevens—the
worthy son of an illustrious father who follows closely in his footsteps
as the best authority on early printed American books in Europe—at his
shop across the street from the imposing Museum building, and to him I
told my story. As I proceeded his interest grew, and before I had
finished he excitedly grasped my arm with one hand and his hat with the
other, exclaiming: “Come with me. This is not a subject for underlings,”
and rushed me across the street without pause until we were in the
sanctum sanctorum of the learned and accomplished Keeper, Alfred W.
Pollard. And to him I told my simple tale, and asked his assistance. Mr.
Pollard is himself a bibliographer of note in his special field, and my
story was not without interest to him, but he refused to share my belief
that the missing broadside was what I supposed it to be, laying much
stress upon the black-letter feature as proof of its English origin. The
unsuccessful search for the missing broadside had evidently been called
to his notice, and the failure to produce anything in the millions of
books catalogued in that vast collection, he considered a challenge to
the efficiency of himself and his staff of assistants. A few days later,
he acknowledged failure; but gave me the interesting information that in
tracing the broadside back to its accession he had found that it was
acquired by the Museum in the year 1865, and formed part of a bundle of
miscellaneous matter, being considered of so little importance as not
even to have been mentioned in the contents of the bundle. Printing of
the letter F of the Catalogue was completed in 1888, and since that time
an expansion of the classification of books upon the shelves had been
made, from which dated its disappearance. He would not, however,
discontinue his efforts to find it. After apologizing for giving him a
“bad half-hour,” which only the importance of the broadside excused, our
second interview ended. On my last day in London, I went again with Mr.
Stevens to call on Mr. Pollard about the matter, and told him that I had
made my arrangements to fly from London to Paris on the morrow, and
asked him if these old eyes of mine were never to behold the holy grail.
“In black-letter?” he queried, touching the weak spot in my armor. “In
duodecimo!” I countered, pointing to the rent in his own. And the third
interview ended with his assurance that the search would go on until the
missing broadside was found.
And there the matter rests, very much in the condition of the story of
the cook who asked the skipper: “Is any thing lost when you know where
it is?” And to the skipper’s gruff response, “Of course not,” he
pleasantly replied: “I am glad to know that our only iron soup kettle
wasn’t lost when it fell over-board into the Bay.”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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