XVI. ANALECTA 177 XVII. THE SUBJECT CONTINUED 183 XVIII. “JOE MILLER’S JESTS”--HISTORY, CHARACTER, AND SUCCESS OF THE PUBLICATION--JOHN MOTTLEY THE EDITOR 188 XIX. JEST-BOOKS CONSIDERED AS HISTORICAL AND LITERARY MATERIAL--THE TWOFOLD POINT ILLUSTRATED--LOCALISATION OF STORIES 200 XX. THE SO-CALLED “TALES OF SKELTON”--SPECIMENS OF THEM--SIR THOMAS MORE AND THE LUNATIC--THE FOOLISH DUKE OF NEWCASTLE--PENNANT THE ANTIQUARY--THE “GOTHAMITE TALES”--STORIES CONNECTED WITH WALES AND SCOTLAND 210 [Illustration] STUDIES IN JOCULAR LITERATURE [Illustration] CHAPTER I. INTRODUCTORY REMARKS ON THE REAL USE AND IMPORTANCE OF JESTS AND ANECDOTES. One of the Anglo-Saxon kings gave the manor of Walworth to his jester Nithardus; and we have all heard how the magnificent benefaction of St. Bartholomew’s Hospital, subsequently repaired by Sir Richard Whittington, was founded by Rahere, the _joculator_ and favourite of a later monarch of this isle. In former days, to be a fool within certain lines, or a buffoon of a special type, was a walk of life not to be despised either by a man or by his friends. The jokes which he made were negotiable securities of first-class value. Not a five-pound note, but broad lands and the smiles of a prince, awaited the fortunate utterer of the _bon-mot_ and the fountain of merriment and good humour. Even in the time of Charles II. the prosperity of the vocation had sensibly declined. Charles liked people who contributed to his amusement; but shabby constitutional restraints precluded him from endowing a pleasant fellow, who could play a conjurer’s tricks with the risible muscles and the purse-strings of his sovereign, with a large and valuable estate. Nay, before the Stuart era, Henry VII., whose parsimony has been exaggerated, and who gave freely to many charitable objects, had to content himself with presenting the makers of _jeux d’esprit_ with a few shillings--the shillings, of course, of that epoch. The greater rarity of learning, and its status as a special mystery or cult, surrounded these ancient scholars with an atmosphere which we have not only a difficulty, but a sort of delicacy, perhaps, in thoroughly penetrating, so as to enable us to arrive at an absolutely accurate valuation of their gifts. Among their contemporaries and even immediate descendants they were regarded as something more than human; and this sentiment, while it, as a rule, limited itself to worshipful awe, not unfrequently degenerated into a superstitious dread fatal to the possessors of incomprehensible faculties. * * * * *