In July, 1808, the date of the preceding communication, I, too, possessed a table book, and silver style, of an age as ancient, and similar to that described; except that it had not “a Kalender.” Mine was brought to me by a poor person, who found it in Covent-garden on a market day. There were a few ill-spelt memoranda respecting vegetable matters formed on its leaves with the style. It had two antique slender brass clasps, which were loose; the ancient binding had ceased from long wear to do its office, and I confided it to Mr. Wills, the almanack publisher in Stationers’-court, for a better cover and a silver clasp. Each being ignorant of what it was, we spoiled “a _table-book_ of Shakspeare’s time.” The most affecting circumstance relating to a table book is in the life of the beautiful and unhappy “Lady Jane Grey.” “Sir John Gage, constable of the Tower, when he led her to execution, desired her to bestow on him some small present, which he might keep as a perpetual memorial of her: she gave him her _table-book_, wherein she had just written three sentences, on seeing her husband’s body; one in Greek, another in Latin, and a third in English. The purport of them was, that human justice was against his body, but the divine mercy would be favourable to his soul; and that, if her fault deserved punishment, her youth at least, and her imprudence, were worthy of excuse, and that God and posterity, she trusted, would show her favour.”[4] * * * * * Having shown what the ancient table book was, it may be expected that I should say something about _My_ TABLE BOOK. The title is to be received in a larger sense than the obsolete signification: the old table books were for private use--mine is for the public; and the more the public desire it, the more I shall be gratified. I have not the folly to suppose it will pass from _my_ table to _every_ table, but I think that not a single sheet can appear on the table of any family without communicating some information, or affording some diversion. On the title-page there are a few lines which briefly, yet adequately, describe the collections in my _Table Book_: and, as regards my own “sayings and doings,” the prevailing disposition of my mind is perhaps sufficiently made known through the _Every-Day Book_. In the latter publication, I was inconveniently limited as to room; and the labour I had there prescribed to myself, of commemorating _every_ day, frequently prevented me from topics that would have been more agreeable to my readers than the “two grains of wheat in a bushel of chaff,” which I often consumed my time and spirits in endeavouring to discover--and did not always find.