University of Virginia Library

Swift's Verses on the Death of Dr. Swift: the Notes
by
Clive Probyn

The text of Swift's best-known poem generated a substantial bibliography of studies before and after Harold Williams's reconstructed text in The Poems of Jonathan Swift (3 vols., Oxford, 1937: second edition, 1958, II, 551-572), but his reconstruction of the Notes has passed without subsequent comment.[1] After Williams, all serious editions of Swift's poems include his notes at some point, conceding if only tacitly their function as part of Swift's total meaning in the poem; but all hover uncertainly around the questions of their provenance and their status, in marked contrast, of course, to the unproblematical but similarly functioning notes added by Pope to The Dunciad.[2] Williams examined only four examples with manuscript additions (from a still unknown total number), and his reconstruction was therefore appropriately cautious. In the absence of definitive evidence caution is still necessary, for the textual depredations of King and Pope have left a permanent legacy of textual uncertainty.

Thus to one note (to 1. 345) Williams attaches the contradictory puzzle common to them all: this note, from a single and unique source as far as Williams was then aware, 'may have come originally from Swift himself' (p. 566).[3] What follows is an attempt to penetrate the screen erected by King, Pope, Faulkner, and to some extent Swift himself, and to provide the textual parameters inside which Williams's reconstruction of the Notes may be further considered in the light of new evidence. Swift 'substantially approved' (Williams's words) Faulkner's 1735-8 edition of his Works, and expressed anger and dismay at the 381-line King-Pope edition of the poem, which cut 165 lines, all of the notes, and added 62 lines from The Life and Genuine Character of Dr. Swift (London, J. Roberts, 1733), for the first folio version published by Bathurst in 1739. We also know that Swift took steps to ensure that Faulkner produced an authentic version of the original poem. There are thus two questions at issue. What is the evidence for Swift's authorship and sanction of those parts of the Notes and additions which have come down to us only in manuscript form and in other than Swift's own handwriting? And secondly, is a minimally uncertain reconstruction of these Notes possible?

I

There is a remarkable degree of consensus amongst those surviving copies of Faulkner's 1739 Dublin octavo editions of the Verses which contain manuscript additions. Without being able to prove that Swift himself supplied the Notes, his modern editors assume that the burden of internal evidence leans the other way, i.e. in all likelihood Swift did supply the Notes because one can conceive of no other candidate in Dublin at the time who could have done so. The specific impetus for my discussion is two-fold: Irvin Ehrenpreis's recent comment that 'A careful study of Swift's [sic] notes to the Verses would be a valuable work';[4] and secondly, a previously unknown copy of Faulkner's 1739 Verses containing substantially all other examined manuscript additions plus two unique and pertinent additions, the whole volume carefully matching manuscript notes to the space Faulkner left blank in the printed text.[5] The latter tends to confirm Ehrenpreis's hypothesis that Swift wrote the Verses to be published after he died. This hypothesis

is presumably based on Swift's letter to Pope (1 May, 1733: Correspondence, IV, 152) disclaiming all responsibility for The Life and Genuine Character of Dr. Swift, and stating that 'the true one . . . is not proper to be seen till I can be seen no more'.[6]

Williams's reconstruction was based on Faulkner's Dublin octavo. He filled in all of Faulkner's blanks, made forty minor emendations of accidentals, corrected Faulkner's mis-prints, and introduced one substantive and well-known error (l. 19: him/me). For this he collated the following: his own copy of the 1739 Dublin Verses with Faulkner's firstedition title page (now in Cambridge University Library and described there and here as Williams 4101); his own copy of the same with a fifthedition title page (previously owned by Dowden, also now in Cambridge and known as Williams 4102); a copy of Faulkner's 1739 Verses completed in Forster's hand (Forster Collection, Victoria and Albert Museum Library, described here as LVA-F); and the Huntington Library copy of Bathurst's second, London, folio edition of the poem (1739), for which I adopt Foxon's designation (as for all additional copies below), S922.[7] All have manuscript additions.

Foxon gives five locations for copies of the 1739 Dublin Verses (S926) with manuscript additions. I have compared six copies with Faulkner's first-edition title page and one copy each of the second and fifth Faulkner editions. They are:

• MoU Monash University copy of S926
• 4101 Williams's copy of S926, Cambridge University Library
• CSmH Huntington Library copy of S926
• LVA-F Forster Collection copy of S926
• ICN Newberry Library copy of S926
• TxU1-2 Humanities Research Centre, Texas, copies of S926 and S927
• 4102 Williams's copy of S930, Cambridge University Library

The collation of all copies above is the same: 8° (in fours): A 4, B-F4; pp. 1-4, 5-44, 45-48, 48 advt. All ms. additions are recorded below, i.e. additions made to both the printed text of the poem (such as the filling in of blanks) and to the printed (or blank spaces left for) notes. I have recorded all substantive variants but ignored differences in punctuation, capitalisation, spelling, spacing, and the use of contractions, except where they might conceivably affect the sense. Line references are to Williams, Poems (second edition, 1958), II, 553-572, and the left-hand column gives a complete transcription from the previously unrecorded Monash copy, here described as MoU.

                                                               

Williams line refs.	MoU copy of S926	Variants in other S926s with MS. adds.
[A2]	supposed [deleted with three rules] }
[A2]	The Notes are printed against the Author's Judgment (not to say Co¯ands) }	[unique: unamended in all other copies
53		I grieve to }
77		And tho 'tis } TxU2 only
135		But }
179		And }
180	Queen	[all copies except TxU2 (blank)
181	Queen	[all copies except LVA-F, TxU1-2, 4102 (blank)
183	then let him	why let him [in all other copies: ICN as MoU
184	the Medals were	[all copies
185	'em, 'tis true, but	them I own; but (4101, CSmH, 4102)
		him, I own, but (LVA-F)
		I would send them (TxU1)
		them, 'tis true, but (TxU2)
		ICN as MoU
185		LVA-F has marked these lines (as alternatives?) at line 185:
		I promis'd him, but that's the most
		I cannot send them to his ghost
186	was the Princess	was ye Princess (CSmH)
		was a Princess (LVA-F, TxU1-2)
		4101-2, ICN, as MoU
187	the King	the K--g (4101)
		a King (LVA-F, TxU1)
		TxU2 blank
		CSmH, ICN, 4102, as MoU
189 n.	Scotch [vile deleted]	an impudent Scotch (TxU1); unamended in all other copies
		ICN as MoU
190		obert (all copies, except MoU, CSmH, TxU2, 4102: blank)
190 n.	she forgot them or thought them too dear. The Dean being in Ireland sent Mrs. Howard a piece of Indian Plad, made in that Kingdom, which the Queen seeing took from her & wore it her self, and sent to the Dean for as much as wou'd cloath her self & Children, desiring he wou'd send the charge of it: He did the former, it cost thirty five pounds; but he said he wou'd have nothing except the Medals. He went next Summer to England, was treated as usual, and she being then Queen, the Dean was promis'd a Settlement in England, but returned as he went, and instead of favour or Medals, hath been ever since under her Majesties displeasure.	˜ they (CSmH) ˜
		˜ & her Children (TxU2) ˜
		˜ was the Summer following in ˜ (4101-2)

                                   

		˜ instead of receiving of her intended favours or ye ˜ (LVA-F, TxU2)
191		[this note in all copies if he died (TxU1) unamended in all other copies
192	ob	[all copies except TxU2, 4102 (blank)
192 n.		a mortal Enemy (TxU1: no great Friend underlined: all other copies unamended)
192 n.	more.	ICN as MoU (again is deleted): all other copies unamended
194 n.	Walpole ill his corruptions [him deleted]	[all copies, except LVA-F (blank)
		ICN as MoU: all other copies unamended to represent his (4101: a printed emendation) his Corruption (TxU1): all other copies have unamended MoU reading to expose his Corruption (ICN, which also has ringed opposed his Measures, has added a unique footnote: 'In another printed Copy it is became his mortal Enemy' [See Bathurst S922 reading discussed below]
196 n.	Walpole perfidiously [injuriously deleted]	[all copies ICN as MoU
	King George	[all copies
	Walpole	[all copies, except LVA-F: Sir Robert Walpole
200 n.	infamy [Shame deleted]	ICN as MoU, TxU1: all other copies unamended
		Poet Laureat TxU1: unique
228		pray (TxU1: and underlined: unique)
239	lead	[led changed to lead in all copies except LVA-F, TxU1
272	Stephen Duck	[all copies except CSmH: blank
277		obert (LVA-F, TxU1, ICN only: all other copies blank)
277 n.	Walpole hires [hath deleted]	CSmH, ICN, 4101-2, as MoU: all other copies read Walpole
278 n.		Merit or [TxU1: inserted after both in phrase both Merit and Luck: unique ICN copy adds to the footnote on Henley: set up an Assembly for the Improvement of Oratory where he makes Speeches at certain Times; the Auditors paying so much a Head. He is half crazed & half a Dunce

                                             

		Sic in quibusdam MSS [unique
281 n.	most [generally deleted: unique
294		Jesus (LVA-F, TxU1, 4102 later hand?) J----s (4101); all other copies blank
340		LVA-F and TxU2 only insert the following lines after 1. 340: And to her Majesty, God bless her, Wou'd speak as free as to her Dresser; She thought it his peculiar whim, Nor took it ill as come from him.
345	Irish enate	[all copies except TxU2: Bench or Senate
345 n.	The Irish Parliament are reduc'd to the utmost degree of Slavery, flattery, corruption & meaness of Spirit; the worse they are treated, the more fawning & servile they grow; under the greatest and most contemptuous grievances they dare not complain, by which baseness & tameness, unworthy of human creatures, the Kingdom is irrecoverably ruin'd.	ICN as MoU throughout note
		˜ unworthy human Creatures ˜(TxU1): all other copies blank
360		gave [meant underlined: TxU1 only
379 n.	after which England was never known to make so mean a figure in Europe, the greatest preferments in the Church, in both Kingdoms, were given to the most ignorant men; fanaticks were publickly caress'd; Ireland utterly ruin'd and enslav'd, only great Ministers heaping up Millions; and so affairs continue till this present 3d day of May 1732 & are likely to go on in the same manner.	[all copies have this note
		[LVA-F and TxU2 omit 'present'
384		Rabble [Babel underlined: TxU1 only
386	Senate Crown	[all copies except TxU2: Senate + blank
387		England's [all copies except MoU
396	Slaves	[all copies
396 n.	Slaves	[all copies
408 n.		for [in underlined: TxU1 only
413		those [they underlined: TxU1 only
417 n.	hitshed	[all copies
422		or [nor underlined: TxU1 only
427		Nor [Not underlined: TxU1 only
428	Crown	[all copies
431 n.		Lords [Dutchess underlined: TxU1 only
438	Lords	[all copies

                                   

439 n.	and tamely submitted to this infamous mark of Slavery, without the least Resentment or Remonstrance.	[all copies
440	Peerage	[all copies
445	Biennial	[all copies except CSmH: blank
445 n.	Parliament, as they call it, in Ireland meet but once in two years, and after giving five times more than they can afford, return home to reimburse themselves by all Country Jobbs & oppression, of which some few only are here mention'd.	Parliament (as they call it) CSmH, TxU1; Parlement 4101; Parliament (as they call it in Ireland) 4102 returned CSmH only
		4101, CSmH as MoU Jobs & Oppressions LVA-F, ICN, TxU1-2, 4102
446	Votes	[all copies
447	Nation stripp'd	[all copies, except TxU1, which gives
		Nation and Country as alternatives
448	rob	fleece (TxU1 only): all other copies as MoU, except LVA-F: blank
449	thieves & Rapparees	[in all copies, except LVA-F: Rogues and Rapparees, and 4102 gives both alternatives
449 n.	(1) The Highwaymen in Ireland are, since the late Wars there, usually call'd Rapparees; which was a name given to those Irish Soldiers who in small parties us'd at that time to plunder the Protestants.	[in all copies, except that TxU2 only has: who used, at that time, in small Parties
452	Barrack	[all copies
452 n.	(2) The Army in Ireland is lodg'd in Barracks, the building and repairing whereof, & other charges have cost a prodigious Sum to that unhappy Kingdom.	[in all copies. 4102 note added in a different hand
453	tax	Ways (4101)
		Acts (TxU2)
		ICN copy blank. All other copies have Tax
466		gibe (TxU1 only: jibe underlined)
469		would he (TxU1 only: mov'd his Pity underlined

II

Faulkner's Dublin edition of 1739 makes two calculated and distinct provisions for the reader's additional manuscript contributions, the precise extent of which, the internal evidence suggests, was already known. First, this overt plea entitled 'The Publisher's Advertisement':

This paragraph is, in one respect, disingenuous. Faulkner, no less than Swift, knew that the English edition was a mangled version of the original (see King's letter quoted below), and his 1739 text had as its main commercial advantage an exposure of the Bathurst folio. In plainly stating that what follows is still textually incomplete there is also the implication that informed sources knew very well what had been cut out. King and Pope were the initial recipients of the complete text and notes of the Verses; but they would be unlikely to send back for distribution in Dublin material which they had already deemed unsuitable for printing and circulation in London, thereby exposing their own edition as a textual travesty of the original. Faulkner's appeal, perhaps, was directed primarily at his Dublin readers.[8] To an English readership, the close working relationship between the only reliable source (Swift) and his only authorised publisher (Faulkner) would render this appeal supererogatory. If Swift remained (at least in public) unwilling to provide an authoritative version of the Notes, then Faulkner could only appeal to those in the Dublin circle who possessed manuscript copies.

My hypothesis is that in all important respects as to substance and wording of the Notes Faulkner knew exactly what was missing; that he had no unequivocal sanction for publishing them from Swift himself, and therefore provided virtually a do-it-yourself edition in which the most inflammatory of the Notes were toned down by excisions. Agreement among the various transcripts of the manuscript notes suggests a single source, perhaps a copy of the complete and original manuscript quite separate from the manuscript sent to and edited by King and Pope for Bathurst. Faulkner's Advertisement coolly functions if (as the MoU copy indicates in a manuscript note on [A2]) Faulkner was simply carrying out Swift's original intention to have the complete poem published only after his death. Certainly, the notes on the Irish parliament and on Walpole and the Queen would provoke both English and Irish interests, as King and Pope realised. They would also have done Faulkner a deal of harm. His publishing relationship with Swift, both profitable and dangerous, had led to his arrest for libel on three occasions between 1731/2 and 1737.[9]

The second provision Faulkner made for readers' additions also suggests that very little indeed lay outside Faulkner's ability to provide.

The simple fact is that he left exactly estimated space beneath the printed text for all subsequent manuscript additions as we know them (with the possible exception of the note at l. 345 on the Irish Parliament, which is cramped even in the MoU copy) and ostentatiously inserted clues to their continuation. The notes which in particular carry the Swiftian tone, i.e. on Queen Anne and the medals (l. 184), on Whig vengeance after the Queen's death (l. 379), and on the pusillanimity of the Irish peers (l. 439), all break in the middle of a printed sentence, and yet provide no more and no less space for the various versions of known manuscript continuations. Swift's scathing attack on the Irish parliament (l. 445) generated a footnote simply beginning with the word The, but again the space to be filled—by a neat secretarial hand (MoU) if not by an untidy scrawl (ICN)—is precisely calculated. It would seem, therefore, that although Faulkner's Advertisement may be explained by political discretion, there is no compelling reason to see it as an excuse for an imperfect text. There is reason for regarding it as a coverup, a device to catch the reader's inquisitive instinct. The MoU copy does state that the Notes were 'printed against the Author's Judgment (not to say Co¯ands)', and if this says anything, it suggests that Swift's Notes were supplied to Faulkner in a provisional form, i.e. complete enough to allocate space for them, but not 'final' versions ready for publication.

Finally, the examination of copies unknown to Williams above yields the following:

• l. 194 n. The CSmH Bathurst folio, p. 12, has the MS reading became his mortal Enemy which ICN S926 gives, the latter stating that the alternative reading exists 'in another printed copy.' The reading common to both copies therefore comes from an as yet unrecorded copy of S926. The Bathurst folio does have some textual importance, since it is copied from at least two printed versions of S926. All of its readings and alternatives are to be found in known copies, except this one.
• l. 294 n. The reading 'Jesus' (LVA-F, CSmH, 4102) also exists in TxU1, and unless the latter were copied from one of the former provides further confirmation (if any were needed) of this being the intended reading (rather than, for example, 'Moses', a reading for which Williams gives no source).
• l. 340 The four lines of verse marked in LVA-F for insertion (as by Dowden on the flyleaf of 4102, taken from 'a copy of the second Dublin edition'), also appear in TxU2: this may be the hitherto unidentified copy Dowden used, or an indication that a further sub-group of annotations existed.
• l. 345 n. Williams used the CSmH Bathurst folio, S922, to supply

  ---

  57

  
  
  
  this note, stating that it existed in no other copy (Poems, II, 566). But the note appears in three other copies of the Faulkner edition, from which the Bathurst copy was completed, i.e. MoU, ICN, TxU1. This can only strengthen Williams's supposition that this note 'may have come originally from Swift himself.'

The CSmH Bathurst folio MS additions incorporate all of Faulkner's printed notes, completes them in manuscript, includes the lines suppressed by King and Pope, and even copies out verbatim the Advertisement which only appears in Faulkner's Dublin edition. Williams cites Bathurst S922 (the Huntington copy) for ll. 360, 384, 422, 427, 447. All of these readings are to be found in TxU1 S926, however. If copies of annotated S926 are at one remove from Swift's manuscript, the Bathurst folio is at two removes, and has no independent textual authority, except in making clear that MS textual variants exist in at least two printed copies of S926.

Teerink indicates that Faulkner's five 1739 editions of the Verses are all of the same printing, the alterations concerning especially some of the notes, and afterwards almost exclusively the punctuation, and that variants occur because sheets from one edition were wrongly mated with those of another.[10] One previously unnoticed error is the apparently random correction of an erroneous catch-word between pp. 24-25 (C4v-D14). Incorrect in MoU, CSmH, TxU1, TxU2 (and in the unannotated Yale copy) but corrected in 4101, 4102, ICN, it is possible that page 24 was set without the footnotes being included, i.e. with the average of 20 lines of text. But in that case the oversight was remedied before printing started by simply removing six lines and taking them over to p. 25. In either case the footnote was available whilst setting up type, and before printing began, a further indication that Faulkner possessed full knowledge of the complete text.

III

On January 5, 1738/9 William King wrote to Swift explaining the reasons for cuts made in the original manuscript. Having taken legal advice, which apparently suggested that the lines on Queen Anne's death and the lines on the Whig ministry's actions following the accession of the King could be construed as treasonable, cuts were reluctantly made. Other cuts were made in deference to Pope's judgment (letter to Mrs. Whiteway, January 30, 1738/9), and King goes on in the former letter to say that since the story of the medals 'is pretty well known . . .

care has been taken that almost every reader may be able to supply the blanks.' As we have seen, variants crept in; but the note is far more inflammatory than the text and is present in all copies with ms. additions. The likelihood of this note coming directly from Swift is undeniable. As a gesture of conciliation towards Swift's supposed displeasure at the cuts, King offered the following: "if after having received the printed copies, which I will send you next week, you shall resolve to have the poem published intire as you put it into my hands, I will certainly obey your commands, if I can find a proper person to undertake the work. I shall go to London the latter end of the next week, when I'll write to you by a private hand more fully than I can venture by the post (Correspondence, V, 133 [my italics]). But King was forestalled. On March 6, King wrote again to Mrs. Whiteway, revealing Faulkner's undoubtedly authorised scheme to expose the discrepancy between the King-Pope version and the original manuscript: "I was not a little mortified yesterday, when the bookseller brought me the Dublin edition, and at the same time put into my hands a letter he had received from Faulkner, by which I perceive the Dean is much dissatisfied with our manner of publication, and that so many lines have been omitted, if Faulkner speaks truth, and knows as much of the Dean's mind as he pretends to know. Faulkner hath sent over several other copies to other booksellers; so that I take it for granted this will soon be reprinted there from the Dublin edition. . ." (Correspondence, V, 139).

Such obliquity is characteristic of Swift's methods of arranging the publication of his works, and although only incomplete printed notes were added in Faulkner's Dublin edition, it was in conformity with Swift's known intention as expressed in the letter of May 1, 1733, to Pope. There would be no point, and some danger, in Faulkner sending to King's London bookseller transcriptions of notes which King and Pope had already cut out on treasonable grounds. Again, it would appear that the complete Notes were to be kept for private release, if at all, by Faulkner in Dublin. There could have been only two sources for this: a manuscript by Swift himself, or more likely copies circulated with Swift's tacit approval, in which relatively minor variants flourished in the absence of an authoritative printed text, as ICN makes clear at 278 n (see above) and as Faulkner's Advertisement makes plain. Additional evidence for the latter is contained in the prefatory matter to Faulkner's Dublin edition of Swift's Works, 4 vols., 1735, for the second volume of which (containing the poems) corrections were made from a copy of the Miscellanies, 1727-32 (Rothschild) in Swift's own hand. In the Publisher's Advertisement the formula 'the supposed Author' (also used in S926) is used half a dozen times. Williams is led to suspect on

stylistic grounds that the Advertisement was actually written not by Faulkner but by Swift himself. Be this as it may, the Preface describes Swift's willingness to allow manuscript copies to circulate: "If we are truly informed, the supposed Author hath often protested, that he never did write three Copies of Verses with the least Intention to have them printed, although he was easy enough to show them to his Friends, and at their Desire was not very scrupulous in suffering them to take Copies."[11]

Williams (III, 827-829) describes the same circumstance in relation to the Legion Club (1736), and reproduces Faulkner's claim to have used Swift's own manuscript for his text of the poem in 1762/3. Of the 1762 Works, Faulkner writes in 'To the Reader' of how Swift 'corrected every Sheet of the first seven Volumes that were published in his Life Time, desiring the Editor to write Notes' (I, vii). Faulkner goes on to affirm that the intimacy and professional trust between author and printer extended even to Swift's private admission of A Tale of a Tub's authorship. Even so, it is beyond belief that Faulkner himself could have written, except to Swift's dictation, the notes on the Queen, the medals, and on the Irish parliament—all of which were withheld from the Notes. Faulkner's role as editor and publisher was explanatory, not evaluative. Of the nearly seventy notes by Faulkner included in Williams's edition a very few supply names for textual blanks, seven are broadly concerned with defining cant words or linguistic usage; eleven concern details of Dublin topography or Irish customs; fifteen deal with textual history and dating of the poems; thirty-four are concerned with details of characters mentioned, with biographical notes and comments on Swift's circle of friends. Only two quite exceptional notes rise to the level of either rage or raillery comparable with the notes to the Verses. That on Smedley (III, 893)— 'A very stupid, insolent, factious, deformed, conceited Parson, a vile Pretender to Poetry, preferred by the D. of Grafton for his wit'—reads like Swift's own revenge on the compiler of Gulliveriana (1728) and the author of An Epistle to . . . Grafton contained therein.[12] The second, on Sheridan (III, 1012-13), includes a signed affidavit from Sheridan himself and appears to be a fragment of the Swift-Sheridan bagatelle which flourished for many years, and which Faulkner simply reproduces.

Swift's efforts were often deliberately employed to resist attempts at

attribution. He delighted both to cover his tracks and to observe closely the efforts of his pursuers. For this reason Faulkner especially was required to adopt a policy of seemingly naive ignorance. Proximity to Swift demanded impersonal detachment as a publisher, hence my argument that Faulkner knew more than he could say and possessed more than he could print. Negative external evidence, paradoxically, only increases this conviction. Thus, if Faulkner knew precisely what was missing in the 1739 octavo Verses, in 1746 he had an opportunity to bring out a truly complete (and posthumous) edition of the poem in the Works. The new Publisher's Advertisement promises exactly this:

Faulkner does make some emendations, but only of a minor stylistic and factual nature. For example, the note on Pulteney is updated (he was made Earl of Bath in 1742); Friendship replaces Favour in the note on Lady Suffolk; the variant line 'I led a Heart' persists; the last note states that Swift had died in Ireland; and the earlier note stating that Swift was 'not acquainted with one single Lord Spiritual or Temporal' now reads 'not acquainted with many Lords Spiritual or Temporal.' But with only one important exception (l. 277, where Walpole's name is inserted), all the blanks remain blank, none of the known manuscript continuations is included, and no space is provided for the missing notes. Moreover, the fact that Faulkner makes no reference to his own 1739 edition but states on the 1746 title-page that the Verses were 'Printed in the Year 1743' suggests that this edition of the poem was determined by other than a desire for a canonical text. As a testimony of loyalty to Swift's known desire not to have the complete poem printed before his death, Faulkner's continuingly incomplete text is, at the very least, a remarkable example of a self-denying ordinance. For subsequent editors, this could have closed the door on all attempts at reconstruction. But it is in no sense the last word. Instead of settling questions, it poses more. At lines 183-187 (the medals episode) Faulkner's 1746 text provides yet another set of variants, indicating if nothing else that none of the manuscript additions in the S926s examined here could have been transcribed from this later edition. All relate back to an earlier and arguably single manuscript source.

Faulkner thus evaded the task of producing a public text of the Verses 'as compleat as possible' in 1746. It is only to the purchasers of the 'private', annotated text of the 1739 octavo that we can refer for evidence that complete notes certainly existed, remarkably consistent with each other across at least eight different contemporary manuscript

copies, and in a form known to Faulkner in 1739. Swift's death did not stop the flow of dangerous new copy to Faulkner, as the analogous publishing history of An Epistle to a Lady and On Poetry: A Rapsody shows;[13] the printer's risky game of textual hide-and-seek was still necessary in order to avoid the continuing threat of legal consequences. But as far as the Verses was concerned, at least some of Faulkner's customers had fully availed themselves of his invitation to fill in the blanks for themselves.[14]

Notes