It is with genuine humour that Mister Sundry Whereof affects to doubt the genuineness of some pages in Sir John’s book. “The Knight’s style,” he observes, “is clear and elegant, whilst that in which the circumstance is narrated of Dr. Johnson’s parchment-covered book, _is_ cloudy, inconsistent, and embarrassed. He therefore begs to propose a few queries, of which the first is, “Would a writer confessedly so exact in his choice of words, as the Knight, talk in this manner: ‘While he was preparing;’ ‘An accident happened?’ As if one should say of that unfortunate divine Dr. Dodd, _an accident_ proved fatal to him; he _happened_ to write another man’s name, &c.”—The whole of this epistle is full of the happiest irony. The point and humour of the third and concluding epistle is of a similar character. After premising certain canons of criticism, in which it is assumed, that “Whenever Sir John Hawkins, in quoting any part of Johnson’s works, adopts a reading different from the editions, it is to be replaced in the text, and the other discarded. Thus, in the vulgar edition of London, vol. xi. of Johnson’s Works, p. 319, we read, ‘And fixed _on_ Cambria’s solitary shore,’ How much better is Sir John’s reading, ‘And fixed _in_ Cambria’s solitary shore!’ “I would not believe that Johnson wrote otherwise, though Johnson himself should affirm it. “Again, in the last number of the Rambler, Johnson says, or is made to say, ‘I have endeavoured to refine our language to grammatical purity.’ How tame, dull, flat, lifeless, insipid, prosaic, &c. is this, compared to what the Knight has substituted—‘_grammar_ and _purity_!’ A fine instance of the figure, _Hen dia duoin_, like Virgil’s _pateris et auro_, or like—; but I will not overpower you with my learning,” &c. The whole of this is admirable, and expressed in a style of the purest humour. Much of this same quality is also conspicuous in Porson’s character of Gibbon, as it is given in his Preface to the Letters to Travis; which character, notwithstanding its great severity, induced Gibbon to solicit an interview with Porson. This accordingly took place, by the intervention of honest Peter Elmsley, and was once repeated, but no acquaintance or further communication ensued. Porson was not of a disposition to pay court even to the most eminent characters; and Gibbon then stood on the highest pinnacle of literary fame, and probably did not take the necessary steps to secure Porson’s further correspondence.