Suecia, or with Mr. S. Turner, that it described the feud wreaked by Beowulf upon Hrothgar. It is necessary to mention that previous to the appearance of his Seyldingis, Thorkelin had published a translation, and I believe a text also, of the Saxon version of Nichodemus's Gospel (vid. Thilo. Cod. Apocryph. N. T. vol. I, p. CXLIV). This I have never seen, and am ignorant both of its value, and date; but should think it probable that it was taken from the copy printed by Thwaites at the end of his Heptateuch. A Danish paraphrase of much merit was made of Beowulf by Dr. N. S. Grundtvig of Copenhagen, and appeared, though I am not quite certain as to the date, under the title Bjowulfs Drape. To this were added, both by himself and Rask, a vast number of conjectural emendations of Thorkelin's text, nearly all of which are in reality the readings of the MS. In the preface was included a copy of the Fight of Finneshum, hitherto shut up in Hickes's Thesaurus, and which I have since thought it necessary to reprint in the appendix to Beowulf. In 1832, Dr. Schmid, a professor of law at Jena, having found it desirable to investigate the Saxon institutions, and formed himself with this view in the great schools of Rask and Grimm, produced his Gesetze der Angelsächsen, a good book, in

which, though printed without assistance from the MSS., numberless errors of the English editors are avoided. And, in 1830, Dr. Mone, the learned continuer of Creutzer's Symbolik, published his Quellen und Forschungen zur Geschichte der Teutschen Litteratur und Sprache, a very large portion of which is occupied with Anglo-Saxon remains, from foreign MSS. In this work, which otherwise would have been a valuable and pleasing addition to our sources of knowledge, there is unhappily a spirit of arrogance, which, objectionable as it always is, is here not borne out by the acquirements of the author. There are a vast number of AngloSaxon interlinear glosses, some of which occur once only, and that for the first time; while many supply analogies with the Gothic, Old High-Dutch, and Old Saxon, which were hardly to be expected. But they have not been always copied with accuracy, and betray a want of acquaintance with Anglo-Saxon MSS. which should have rendered Dr. Mone cautious when he accused English editors of ignorance. Too ignorant they have often been: but Dr. Mone has yet shown no title authorizing him to call them so. The last work which it is proper to notice in connection with this matter, is the Heljand or Old Saxon Gospel Harmony, of which two

MSS. are found, one in the Cotton collection, the other in the Royal library at Munich. In calling this Old Saxon, we are not to be supposed to mean an older form of Anglo-Saxon, or any old copy of an Anglo-Saxon poem. It is a distinct language, used by those whom King Alfred, for distinction, called Eald Seaxas, and who are the Marcomanni, Normanni, and Northalbingii of the middle ages; those two, who, once under Arminius fatally known to the legions of Varus, in the Teutoburger wood, maintained a thirty years struggle under Witichind, against the united power of Charlemagne; the inhabitants of Saxony about the Elbe, and the ancestors of the people of Holstein, Ditmarsch and Stormaria. The Old Saxon language approaches nearer to Anglo-Saxon than any other Teutonic tongue; from the comparative rudeness of the people, it was but little altered, at a late period, and even in the ninth century, from which the Heljand dates, it was older in some of its forms even than the Gothic itself. It is distinguished from Anglo-Saxon chiefly by having preserved the distinctness of its inflections, and avoided the habit of contraction which grows up in all languages in proportion. as they become polished and mercantile. Thus the Anglo-Saxon ealra gewæda cyst (the cost

liness of all garments i. e. the costliest) is in Old Saxon allaro giuuadio kust, obviously older in form though not in date. It may therefore be said that great light is thrown by this tongue, not less upon Anglo-Saxon than all the other LowDutch languages; for not only are single roots, but whole expressions, whole turns of thought, found common to both. Lye having followed a mistake of Hickes (who upon no better authority than a groundless tradition of the Cott. MS. having belonged to King Cnut, invented a Dano-Saxon dialect as the language of the poem) put many words from it into his lexicon; by not distinguishing them he of course created endless confusion: yet I am inclined to think that a complete vocabulary of this tongue might usefully be incorporated with any Anglo-Saxon lexicon. A beautiful text of this poem, whose only fault is the being founded upon the Munich rather than the Cotton codex, but which gives every various reading, was published, in 1832, by Dr. A. Schmeller, of Munich and he promises us speedily a second volume containing both grammar and glossary.

The general conclusion which we must draw from what has been said, is, that a new and powerful impulse has been given to Saxon

learning by two continental scholars : that with no lack of industry to complain of, and with the advantage of possessing vast MSS. collections, we have yet in England suffered ourselves to be crippled by a false system; too many among us have been in so great a hurry to display themselves in a course which was wondered at because it was new, that they have forgotten the golden rule : « Learn to walk before you run. » The errors which men who have enjoyed reputations in this country, have committed are positively nine times in ten the result of not knowing the accidence of the tongue. It is matter of rejoicing that we are improving, however slowly; and I confidently hope that a better era is at hand. At the end of these remarks I shall justify what I have said by subjoining a page or two of my Adversaria, stray notes which have been made in reading various authors. These must however be looked upon not only as pièces justificatives and proofs of what has been advanced, but in the more merciful light of a table of errata by which one or two good books may be rendered more generally useful. Moreover as they and all such notes must rest upon a knowledge of comparative etymology as it is developed in Dr. Grimm's work, it is to be hoped that the