of the same period.[ii] But we have by no means disposed of all of this question as to the pencil-writing, and we shall revert to it. [Footnote hh: It probably records the price paid by the buyer of the whole volume at second-hand in the first part of the century 1600. The first memorandum is quite surely the price paid for the _Familiar Epistles_ alone; for on the binding of the three books into one volume, which took place at an early date, the tops of the capital letters of this possessor's name were slightly cut down.] [Footnote ii: Similar evidence must abound; and perhaps there is more even within the reach of the writer of this article. For he has made no particular search for it; but merely, after reading Dr. Ingleby's _Complete View_, looked somewhat hastily through those of his old books which, according to his recollection, contained old writing,--which, by the way, has always recommended an antique volume to his attention.] That the writing of the "Certificate of the Blackfriars Players," the "Blackfriars Petition," and the marginal readings in Mr. Collier's folio shows that they are by the same hand we cannot see. Their chirography is alike, it is true, but it is not the same. Such likeness is often to be seen. The capital letters are formed on different models; and the variation in the _f-s, s-s, d-s_, and _y-s_ is very noticeable. * * * * * We now turn to another, and, to say the least, not inferior department of the evidence in this complicated case. Mr. Hamilton has done yeoman's service by his collation and publication of all the manuscript readings found on the margins of "Hamlet" in Mr. Collier's folio. It is by far the most important part of his "Inquiry." It fixes indelibly the stigma of entire untrustworthiness upon Mr. Collier, by showing, that, when he professed, after many examinations, to give a list of all the marginal readings in that folio, he did not, in this play at least, give much more than one-third of them, and that some of those which he omitted were even more striking than those which he published. We must be as brief as possible; and we shall therefore bring forward but one example of these multitudinous sins against truth; and one is as fatal as a dozen. In the last scene of the play, Horatio's last speech (spoken, it will be remembered, after the death of the principal characters and the entrance of Fortinbras) is correctly as follows, according to the text both of the folios and the quartos:-- "Of that I shall have also cause to speak; And from his mouth, whose voice will draw on more: But let this same be presently perform'd, Even while men's minds are wild, lest more mischance, On plots and errors, happen." But in Mr. Collier's folio it is "corrected" after this astounding fashion:--