University of Virginia Library

A Restoration Lampoon in Transmission and Revision: Rochester's(?) "Signior Dildo"
by
Harold Love

"The texts of 'Signior Dildo'," writes Keith Walker, "differ widely, not to say wildly. There is general agreement on the title, but upon little else."[1] This challenge has been impossible to pass up. What follows is a report on an attempt to establish the relationship of the texts, together with a reconsideration of the question of authorship. A full collation of the known early texts is included as none has so far been published.[2]

"Signior Dildo" is a lampoon directed at ladies of the court of Charles II on the excuse of their supposed passion for the "Italian" device: as far as is known it is the only poem in the English language wholly devoted to the advocacy of masturbation. It belongs to a tradition of mysogynistic dildo satires which reaches back as far as the sixth mimiamb of Herondas (first or second century A.D.), and was represented in English as early as Nashe's "A Choice of Valentines" (1592). In 1671 a consignment of dildos, in this case French, had been seized on arrival in England and burned, inspiring the widely copied burlesque "Dildoides," which accompanies "Signior Dildoe" in the anthologies of the well-known "Cameron" scriptorium.[3]

The occasion of the poem was the arrival in London of Mary of Modena on 26 November 1673 as the bride-to-be of James, Duke of York—indeed it may even have been written as a set of fescennine verses for some celebration connected with the royal wedding. On 26 January following, a letter from Walter Overbury to Sir Joseph Williamson mentions the sending of "a song of a certain senior that came in with the Dutchesse of Modena," adding that "it reaches and touches most of the ladys from Westminster to Wapping."[4] Its first appearance in print was not to be until 1703, transmission up to that time being exclusively in sung or manuscript form. The currently accepted

attribution to Rochester, while not intrinsically improbable, rests, as we shall see later, on rather thin evidence. Crudely written to the ballad tune "Peg's gone to sea with a soldier," the lampoon gives every sign of hurried composition. Its jaunty tune can be found in Claude M. Simpson, The British Broadside Ballad and its music (New Brunswick, 1966), p. 572.

The sources

The early texts currently known are as follows:

Between them these represent two distinct recensions, the first of which itself exists in two highly variant forms. Once this fact is realised, the disparities begin to look less alarming.

The versions

Version A is represented by the earliest datable text, Od8, a much later one, BLh17, and a single stanza entered by a reader of OSe15. The first of these is part of the personal miscellany of the courtier Sir William Haward, an assiduous collector of topical satire. While it cannot be assumed that Sir William entered material in strict order of acquisition, in this case "Signior Dildo" follows an item which is specifically marked as having been transcribed on 23 November 1673. The poem is in two sections, incongruously separated by "On the bible A Pindarique Ode." Significantly, the second is headed "Additions to Seigneur Dildoe." Taken together with the "Additions," which include some stanzas found in other integral texts, this is by far the longest version of the poem, and indicates that, once in circulation, it had continued to grow. The second source, BLh17, gives a shorter, differently ordered text of the same version without the division into two sections. This occurs in a manuscript anthology with a strong Jacobite tendency, copied no earlier than 1695.[5] Although neatly written, this collection is error-prone. Its marginalia, found throughout the volume, are mostly the creation of the scribe or compiler, who was not very well informed.

Despite the many variants between BLh17 and Od8, they agree consistently against the B version both at the verbal level and in some aspects of stanza sequence; however, all but four of the actual lines of the B version are to be found in one or the other text of the A version. BLh17 lacks only B

version lines 37-40 and 77-92, while the two sections of Od8 contain all the B-version lines except for 45-48 and 77-80. Both A-version texts contain a group of eight lines (ll. 24.1-24.8) which are not found in the B version, while a further forty lines (ll. 28.1-28.12, 28.17-28.32, 36.1-36.4, 40.1-40.4, 92.1-92.4) are unique to Od8. Lines 28.13-28.16, found in Od8 but not BLh17, reappear as a reader's scribble in the margin of the B-version text, OSe15.

Of the B-version texts, all but BLh19 and 03 are found in anthologies of satires issued by the Cameron scriptorium and can be assumed to descend from the archive copy of that scriptorium. V90 and VAd43 belong to Cameron's "Restoration" group and Np42, Of15, OSe15 and Pt2 to his "Venus" group. The handful of anomalous agreements almost certainly arise from chance concurrence in change and the minor memorial contamination to be expected within a busy scribal organisation.[6] The printed text 03 may also derive from a scriptorium original—a matter considered below. The other B-version scribal text, BLh19, is found in a large anthology of satires written circa 1695 which displays a special hostility towards Mary of Modena.[7] Although similar in its layout and scope to the scriptorium anthologies, it is actually the product of another agency.

Order of stanzas

The transmission of the poem is characterised by a remarkable, and at first sight chaotic, degree of variation in the sequence of stanzas. Taking as our point of reference the line-order of BLh19 and VAd43, which is probably that of the lost B-version ancestor, we find the following variants.

A version:

• BLh17: 1-24, 24.1-24.8, 29-32, 25-28, 57-60, 33-36, 45-48, 41-44, 49-56, 65-72, 61-64, 73-76
• Od8/I: 1-16, 29-32, 17-24, 24.1-24.8 [marg.], 57-60, 49-56, 73-76, 61-64
• Od8/2 (the "Additions"): 33-36, 36.1-36.4, 25-28, 28.1-28.32, 81-92, 92.1-92.4, 65-72, 41-44, 37-40, 40.1-40.4
• OSe15-marg: 28.13-28.16.

B version:

• BLh19: 1-92
• Np42: 1-7, 12, 9-20, 25-28, 21-24, 29-92 [line 12 appears twice]
• Of15: 1-56, 61-92
• OSe15: 1-36, 41-72, 28.13-28.16 [marginal in second hand], 73-92[8]
• Pt2: 1-32, 37-92
• V90: 1-32, 37-40, 33-36, 41-48, 53-56, 49-52, 57-92 [both pairs of inverted stanzas reordered by marginal numbers]
• VAd43: 1-92
• 03: 1-32, 37-40, 33-36, 41-92

Apart from the striking variations between versions A and B and the two texts of A, most of these differences arise from nothing more than the scribe skipping over a stanza, and either omitting it entirely or repairing the damage by incorporating it after its incorrectly entered successor. The whole-stanza eyeskip was an easy enough error in a poem composed of four-line stanzas with a refrain, especially as it is only in the conclusion that we encounter anything resembling a developing narrative. The lineation variants suggest that some aspect of the scriptorium master copy led to confusion over the correct position of the stanzas ll. 33-36 and ll. 37-40.

It should be remembered that the sources listed are the survivors of many times that number. The fact that the term "signior" became accepted as a euphemism for dildo indicates that knowledge of the 1673 version was much more widespread than the one remaining pre-1690 transcript would suggest.[9] Of course, this may have happened through hearing the piece sung rather than reading it.

The growth of the text

There are three possible models for the development of the two versions. The first, which I prefer, is that the A version preserves the original form of the poem and the B version is a later (perhaps much later) revision. The second, which has been assumed by all editors of Rochester, is that the B version preserves the original form and the A version is a revision, though in this case one that was already present at the earliest stage of circulation. The third is that the A and the B versions derived independently from a lost version that was either radically different from either of them, or so equally balanced between them as to be assignable to neither group. While such a derivation is textually possible, the historical evidence mitigates against it and it will not be considered further.

The case for the primacy of the A version rests on the form in which the poem was recorded by Haward and the fact that his version is the earliest by at least seventeen years of those that survive. Od8 carefully divides the poem into two sections with the second classified as "Additions." The simple sense of this would seem to be that the fourteen-stanza version preserves something close to the original form in which the poem was circulated at court in 1673, and that the additions represent a subsequent initiative, material from which in some cases found its way into an enlarged integral text. Under this assumption BLh17 would represent a version revised to the extent of incorporating lines 25-28, 33-36, 41-44 and 65-72, found in the Od8 additions, into the main text and rationalizing the order of stanzas, but not so far as adding the "pursuit" stanzas (ll. 81-92), which are present in Od8/2, though not in the concluding position they occupy in the B version. In fact, both Od8/1 and BLh17 conclude with lines 61-64, 73-76, though with the two stanzas in the reverse of this order in Od8/1. As mentioned earlier, all the B-version lines are to be found in one or other of the A-version sources. Under

this hypothesis, the B version would represent a second level of revision, based on an A-version text different from either of those we possess.

An opposed view, tacitly accepted by Vieth, Wilson and Walker, is that it is the B version, not Od8/1, that represents the original form of the poem; that Od8/1, by implication, should be regarded as a cut-down version of this; and that Od8/2 is an assemblage of "lost" as well as added stanzas. (In fact none of the editors mentioned even discusses the problem of the versions, only Walker warning his readers that there are problems with the text of this poem.) This order of development is not impossible but requires us to assume a self-consciously literary origin for the poem, which seems at odds with its improvisatory, occasional air and the likelihood that its early transmission would have been as much in sung as in written form. (The B version is certainly the more polished.) It also seems to proceed from the assumption that the poem is the work of Rochester rather than, say, of some court singer, an assumption that is far less secure than editors have suggested. A further objection, already raised, is that, while we know from BLh17 and the marginal addition to OSe15 that the A version was known in the 1690s, there is no evidence prior to this date for the existence of the B version.

To gain further purchase on the dating problem it will be necessary to consider the political meaning of the satire both at the time of composition and at that of its renewed circulation in the mid-1690s. In its original conception it was an attack on the Yorkist party at court, whose position had been strengthened by the marriage of the Catholic heir to the throne to a Catholic princess. (This theme is particularly apparent in Od8/2, but the majority of the victims throughout were either Catholics or sympathisers.) Its circulation at this period was clearly anonymous and its substance elastic: Haward went as far as to leave a blank space for any future additions he might acquire or invent. Intended for singing, it was to be regarded as a performance piece rather than a work for the eye. Once its topicality departed, it ceased to be transcribed and is found in none of the many scribal anthologies of the later 1670s and the 1680s.

The reappearance of the poem in anthologies of the 1690s must have resulted from more than the chance survival of a copy. There could hardly have been much interest in the sexual taunts of twenty years earlier, but there would certainly have been in the connection with Mary of Modena, who had gone into exile in December 1688 and was now living near Paris with her husband, James II. The revival of a poem poking fun at the events of her marriage and at the morals of the Catholic nobility of that epoch would have an obvious polemic value to supporters of the Protestant succession. Moreover, if the renewed circulation of the satire at this stage, in anthologies written by professional scribes, was a deliberate anti-Jacobite initiative, it is also possible that the rewriting that produced the B version was done at that time. The compiler of BLh17 and the annotator of OSe15 were presumably interested in the poem for the same reason but had encountered it in the A version.

By accepting the hypothesis that Od8/1 preserves the earliest form of the poem and that all other surviving texts are derived from this version (or something like it), we are able to establish the place of BLh19 in the tradition. Its agreement in A-version readings against the scriptorium texts at 12 "chance get," 17 "The," 21 "My good," 30 "Harrys," 56 "fittest," 59 "With" and 84 "upon" (see list of variants) indicates that it cannot itself be descended from the Cameron scriptorium master copy, but is a collateral descendent from a higher-level ancestor. Reconstruction of the readings of this ancestor would require adjudication between those of BLh19 and those of the scriptorium master copy which can itself be reconstructed from its descendants. The printed text of 1703 may also be independently derived from the common ancestor of BLh19 and the scriptorium master copy, though the evidence for this is less marked, and I would place greater weight on its agreements with V90 which include the displacement of lines 33-36.[10]

Authorship

"Signior Dildo" has been accepted by all editors of Rochester without demur, but the evidence for his authorship is not particularly strong. The major considerations against it are as follows:

• (1) A vast mass of satirical verse not by Rochester was attributed to him by scribes and printers. (This problem has been exhaustively treated by Vieth in his Attribution in Restoration poetry [New Haven, 1963].)
• (2) Neither of our witnesses from 1673-74, Walter Overbury and Sir William Haward, appear to have thought the poem was his work. Verse by Rochester was eagerly sought at this period and there can be no doubt that the possibility of his authorship would have been mentioned if it had been suspected.
• (3) The poem does not appear in any of the manuscript and printed collections of Rochester's verse and Rochesteriana that appeared in 1680, the year of his death, and for some time following. The manuscripts containing the attribution were all written at least a decade after that date.
• (4)BLh19 attributes it to him in the "Catalogue" at the end of the volume (p. 762) but not in the text proper, suggesting a degree of uncertainty about the matter. The scribe of BLh17 copying circa 1695 was not aware of the attribution.
• (5) The fact that the Cameron scriptorium archive copy's attribution is repeated in its descendants Of15, OSe15, Pt2, V90, and VAd43 does nothing to strengthen that attribution. Vieth's argument that the numerical weight of the attributions to Rochester "outweighs the single ascription" to Charles Sackville, Earl of Dorset and Fleetwood Sheppard only betrays his imperfect understanding of the textual relationships involved, despite their being made clear by Cameron's article (Complete Poems, p. 192).

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• (6) The attribution to Dorset and Sheppard, found in Np42, a fairly late production from the scriptorium, presumably reflects an emendation made to the archive copy subsequent to the writing of the texts with the Rochester attribution. There would seem to be no reason for doing this apart from the controller of the archive having become persuaded that the poem was not by Rochester.
• (7) The victims of the poem include the Countess of Shrewsbury (ll. 45-48), who was the mistress of Rochester's patron and close friend, George Villiers, second Duke of Buckingham, and the Countess of Falmouth (ll. 25-28), who was on the point of marriage with another close friend, Dorset (who must himself, for this reason, be regarded as unlikely to have written it). There can be no doubt that the relationship between these three peers was a very close one during the mid-1680s.[11] (However, this objection would not apply to Od8/1, which contains neither of the stanzas.)

Against this, the only piece of external evidence that might link Rochester with the poem is two lines from a satire of 1680, "The visitt": "There was obscene Rotchesters Choise storys | Of matrix Glances Dildo and Clittoris."[12] But a reference to dildos does not mean a reference to "Signior Dildoe": it could easily have been inspired by "Tunbridge Wells," ll. 29-34, The Destruction of Sodom, one of whose characters is a dildo-maker, "Upon Cary Frazer," or whatever lost work was the source of the puzzling "matrix glances." The story of the Countess of Northumberland hiding her dildo under the pillow (l. 31) seems to be alluded to in "Timon," ll. 80-82; but this information would also have been available to Rochester's companions in riot, who included Dorset and Sheppard. If, indeed, the attribution to Rochester depends on no more than an annotation made to a single manuscript possibly as much as ten years after his death, and subsequently deleted in one of the descendants of that text in favor of another attribution, it cannot be regarded very seriously. This is not to say that Rochester was not capable of writing the poem, or would not have enjoyed reading it, simply that the existing attributions cannot in any way be regarded as conclusive.

List of variants [13]

This list is presented as a supplement to Walker's outstanding critical edition of Rochester, but can also be used with any other published text of the poem, since the lemma (here given in modern spelling) is not that of any specific text but simply the numerically best-represented variant of its variation. Lineation variants are given separately above. Accidental variants and

those arising from contractions have been included only when they seem to be of special interest. In V90 the refrain is often abbreviated or truncated with a dash. These variants have not been recorded. Pointed brackets ({}) within a record indicate a variant form of the word immediately preceding.

• 0.1 title] Seignor. Dildoe BLh17; Signior Dildo 1674. BLh19; Seignior Dildo By Lord Dorset & Mr: Shepperd Np42 (in marg: 1673); To the Tune of Pegg's gone to Sea with a Souldier Od8/1; Additions to Seigneur Dildoe Od8/2; Signior Dildoe By the {om. Pt2} E: of Rochester. 1673 Of15, OSe15, Pt2; Seignior Dildo V90; Signior Dildo VAd43; Signior Dildoe, by the Earl of Rochester, 1678. 03 Note: the spelling "Seignor" is used uniformly in BLh17. Od8/1 uses "Seigneur" and Od8/2, apart from the "Seigneur" of its title, "Seignior." The remaining texts use "Signior"; however, the "Seig . . ." variant recurs in BLh19 (ll. 24, 61, 72), OSe15 (l. 5), V90 (title, and ll. 8, 28, 44), and VAd43 (ll. 8, 72).
• Stanzas numbered: 1-23 BLh19, Np42, 03
• 0.2 Reader's annotations in a later hand] By Ld. Rochester, as in the Index; but by Ld. Dorset & Mr Sheppard, as in D P. v 2, p 13. & A°: 1673. BLh19; In B H: vol 2 p 5. a better Copy BLH17 [14]
• 1 You ladies all] Oh all ye fair Ladies BLh17; O all yee young Ladyes Od8/1; You ladies V90, VAd43
• 2 The Dutchess of York when she came from Modena in Italy to be married to the Duke of York, since King James the 2nd BLh17-marg; York Pt2-marg, keyed to "Dutchesses"
• 2 Who] That Od8/1
• 3 Pray, did you {˜ not 03} lately observe in the show] I pray you enquire the next time you {˜ doe Od8/1} go BLh17, Od8/1
• 4 A] For a BLh17, Od8/1
• 5 This] The Np42, OSe15, Pt2, VAd43
• 5 signior was one of her Highness's] Seignor. Dildoe was the cheif of the BLh17, Od8/1; Signior was of her Dutchesses 03
• 6 And helped] That help't BLh17; That came Od8/1
• 6 her] ˜ safe Od8/1
• 7 I could not in Conscience but let you all know BLh17, Od8/1
• 8 Np42 substitutes line 12 by anticipation
• 8 I have no more need for {of BLh19}] Of {om. Od8/1} the happy Arrival of BLh17, Od8/1
• 10 next] om. BLh17-uncorr.
• 10 go {got V90} thither] endeavour BLh17, Od8/1
• 10 yourselves] your self BLh17, Od8/1, V90, VAd43
• 12 chance to get a] there get a BLh17; chance get a BLh19, Od8/1, OSe15; have a V90; chance to get 03
• 12 of] ˜ this Od8/1
• 13 You'll {You will Od8/1; You would 03} take him at first for no person of note] Tho' at first he appears a Man of small note BLh17
• 14 he appears] hee'le appeare Od8/1
• 14 plain] small BLh17
• 15 virtuous] main BLh17
• 16 You'll] You will BLh17; You would 03
• 16 worship] ˜ this BLh17, Od8/1
• 17 The Dutchess of York. BLh17-marg [15]
• 17 My] The BLh17, BLh19; By V90, VAd43

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• 17 heavens prosper] Heau'n prosper Od8/1, V90, 03; God bless BLh17
• 18 then] & BLh17, Od8/1, V90
• 18 brought] sent BLh19
• 19 But his head in the circle he scarcely] But his head in the Crowd he hardly BLh17; When scarce in ye Circle his face he Od8/1
• 20 was] is BLh17; ˜ this Od8/1
• 21 Countess of Suffolk. BLh17-marg
• 21 The good] The BLh17; My good BLh19, Od8/1
• 22 got this poor stranger hid] hid the {this Od8/1} poor stranger BLh17, Od8/1
• 23 by chance came the secret] the Secret by chance came BLh17
• 24 stole Signior] did snatch the BLh17
• 24.1-24.8 Her undutifull Daughter though dearly she lov'd

• 26 Her] That ˜ Od8/2
• 26 wear] wore V90, 03
• 27 Might] May Od8/2
• 27 the expence] her expences BLh17; that expence Od8/2, 03
• 28 How lusty a {˜ young Od8/2} swinger {Swindger Of15-corr.}] What a lusty brave stranger BLh17
• 28 is] was Np42, Pt2
• 28.1-28.32 Great Sr, I pray, what doe you intend,

• 29 Lady Montague Np42-marg.; Ralph Ld. Moun:/tagus Lady Of15-marg., OSe15-marg.; Countess of Northumberland Marry'd to Ralph Ld Mountague Pt2-marg
• 29 By the help of this gallant] The Seignorr. liv'd long with BLh17; This Seigneur once dwelt with Od8/1
• 30 Against the fierce Harris {Harrys BLh19}] Who from all Enimies BLh17; And from all ye feirce Harryes Od8/1 [18]
• 30 preserved] kept Np42
• 30 herself] him BLh17; her Od8/1
• 31 She stiffled him {om. V90} almost] But she kept so close BLh17; She had smother'd him almost Od8/1
• 31 beneath her] beneath the BLh17, Of15, OSe15, Pt2; vnder her Od8/1
• 32 So closely she embraced] She had like to have smother'd poor BLh17; 'Tis a barbarous Nation, quoth Od8/1
• 33-36 omitted Pt2
• 33 Dutchess of Grafton. BLh17-marg
• 33 Our dainty fine duchesses {Dutchess 03}] A Delicate Dutchess BLh17
• 33 have got] who has found out BLh17; having got 03
• 34 dote on] be fond of BLh17
• 34 the sake] for Loue Od8/2
• 34 prick] --- 03

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• 35 The fops] How this Lord BLh17; But their hopes Od8/2
• 35 were] are BLh19-uncorr., Np42, Of15, OSe15
• 35 did Their Graces] if her Grace did BLh17; if their Graces OSe15
• 35 discretion] Direction V90
• 36.1-36.4 The Maydens of Honour went to the Sea-side In comely manner, to meete the Dukes Bride; They tooke not much notice of Prince Rinaldo, But all made their Court to Seignior Dildoe. Od8/2
• 37-40 omitted BLh17, OSe15
• 37 Her Grace of] call'd Dutchesse Od8/2
• 38 Has swallowed more pricks than] Hath Swallowed pricks as numberlesse, as th' Od8/2
• 38 ocean] Nation 03
• 38 has] hath Od8/2
• 38 sand] Land 03
• 39 But by] But with Od8/2; By V90
• 39 so large {wide 03} it does grow] is now grown soe low Od8/2
• 40 It is] It's Np42; That shee is Od8/2; Tis V90
• 40 for just] for Od8/2
• 40.1-40.4 That stiffe-stalking Lord, with his long timber'd prick, Hath shutt himselfe up, & pretends, to bee sicke, 'Cause Cleueland intends, that the King shall bestow Her Son Ewstons blew Garter on Seigneur Dildoe. Od8/2
• 41 Dutchess of York. BLh17-marg [19]
• 41 though she looks] tho' she looks so BLh17; who look't soe Od8/2
• 42 With such a gallant is contented] Is well contented with this Seignior Od8/2
• 43 for fear] least BLh17, 03; because that Od8/2
• 43 the] our BLh17
• 43 her secrets] the secret BLh17; nothing of it Od8/2
• 44 For a] For her Od8/2, 03; For V90
• 45-48 omitted Od8
• 45 of the] of BLh17
• 45 name] ˜? BLh19, 03
• 46 She's] Is BLh17
• 47 forsake] forsook Pt2
• 48 She'll then] She must BLh17
• 48 contented] content BLh17
• 48 with Signior] with her Doughty BLh19
• 49 Red Sheldon] Read, Shinden BLh17
• 49 tall] call V90, VAd43
• 50 his] om. BLh19-uncorr.
• 50 so] thus Od8/1
• 51 Signior] But Sr BLh17, Od8/1
• 51 Bernard] Barnard Np42, V90, VAd43, 03
• 51 has] hath Od8/1
• 51 promised] proffer'd BLh17
• 51 a journey] his service BLh17
• 52 Instead of a Prick to fetch a lusty Dildoe BLh17
• 52 bring] brink Of15
• 53 Doll] Moll: BLh17, 03
• 53 no] not V90
• 53 longer] more Od8/1
• 53 must] can Od8/1

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• 54 And therefore is proferred {offer'd BLh17}] Wee'll proffer her therefore Od8/1
• 55 being] are so BLh17
• 55 she smells] ye Smell's Od8/1
• 56 And needs must be fitted {fittest BLh19; fitter Od8/1}] Which makes her the fittest BLh17
• 57-60 omitted Of15
• 57 Dutchess of St. Albans. BLh17-marg [20]
• 57 his] her BLh17, V90
• 58 his] her BLh17
• 59 In his] With a BLh17; With his BLh19; In a Od8/1
• 59 Pergo] Burgoe BLh17; pergo 03
• 60 with] ˜ this Od8/1
• 61 Were this signior but known to] Should this Seignor. be known to BLh17; If he were but well us'd by Od8/1
• 61 citizen] Citty BLh17
• 62 He'd keep their fine] 'Twould preserve their BLh17
• 62 the] their BLh19
• 62 of shops] o'th' Shops Od8/1; 0 {of 03} their Shops V90, 03
• 63 rascals] Cuckolds BLh17
• 63 deserve] ˜, that Np42, Od8/1
• 63 should still] should BLh17
• 64 his nephew] Seignor. BLh17
• 65 Killigrew's] ˜ fair BLh17
• 65 north {that 03} Holland's fine flower] the flower of Dort BLh17; the fine Flowre of Dort Od8/2
• 66 signior] stranger BLh17
• 66 fart and belch sour] fart belch & snort BLh17; Belch, Fart, & Snort Od8/2
• 67 And {˜ then BLh19-corr.} her Dutch breeding farther {further Of15, OSe15, Pt2, 03; the further Np42}] And more of her civil Dutch breeding BLh17, Od8/2
• 67 to] did BLh19-uncorr.
• 68 Says] Cryes BLh17, Od8/2; Cry'd Np42
• 68 to] tote Od8/2
• 69 He civilly came] This Seignior went Od8/2
• 69 the] om. BLh19-uncorr.
• 70 proffered] offerd BLh17, Od8/2
• 70 fair] sweete Od8/2
• 70 Madam] Mrs. BLh17, Od8/2
• 71 Catzo BLh17-marg
• 71 intrigue] intrigue it BLh17; haue intrigued it Od8/2; imagine V90
• 71 Cazzo] Bartrow BLh17-uncorr.; Cadzo Np42, Of15, OSe15, Pt2-uncorr.[21]
• 72 mine] my BLh17, Od8/2, V90
• 73 sound, safe] sound BLh17; ˜, & Od8/1
• 74 candle, carrot] Candle, Finger, Od8/1; Carrot, Candle BLh17
• 74 or] or your 03
• 75 nasty] silly BLh17
• 75 devices] Devises V90
• 75 and] to BLh17, Od8/1
• 76 How you rate the just {om. Od8/1} merits {Merit 03} of] And resolve yourselves contented with BLh17

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• 77-80 omitted Od8
• 77-92 omitted BLh17
• 77 Cazzo] Cadzo Np42
• 78 he swore] did swear yt V90
• 79 shut up himself] shut himself Np42; shut himself up 03
• 81 Apparently written over l. 85 erased by scraping OSe15
• 81 rabble] number Od8/2
• 82 Now'r snub'd by the Porter, & kept out of doore Od8/1
• 83 Maliciously] Mischeviously BLh19
• 83 waited] waiting OSe15
• 84 fell] sett Od8/2
• 84 on] upon BLh19, Od8/2
• 85 Nigh wearied out, the poor] From this barbarous Rabble this Od8/2
• 86 And] All Od8/2
• 86 full cry] him nigh Od8/2
• 87 from] out of Od8/2
• 88 heaven's] Gods Od8/2
• 88 save] safe OSe15
• 89 The] And my Od8/2
• 89 into a] into Of15, OSe15, Pt2; out in a Od8/2
• 90 To see] When she saw Od8/2
• 90 BB [variously punctuated]] Of15, OSe15, Pt2, V90, VAd43; B---x BLh19; B---ks Np42, 03; Ballocks Od8/2
• 91 had not] had OSe15
• 91 retarded] ouerladed Od8/2
• 92 Indeed it] It Od8/2, V90
• 92 gone] ˜ very Od8/2
• 92.1-92.4 Into Yorke-House at last for protection he fled, He knew himselfe safe with a Nation well bred, And the Count de Grammont by the Marques d'Ansou To his Countesse att Paris sent Seignior Dildoe. Od8/2
• 92.1 Finis BLh19
• 92.1 Ld. Rochr. V90; Ld. Rochester VAd43

Conclusion

The main point of interest to emerge from the collation is that, as already demonstrated, BLh19 is not a Cameron scriptorium text but independently derived from the B-version ancestor. Among the scriptorium texts, the Restoration pair (V90, VAd43) form a sub-group in which VAd43 by virtue of having no unique variants must be declared the ancestor and V90 the copy; however, it would be rash to assume that this relationship was consistent throughout the entire length of these bulky anthologies. There is no firm evidence among the variants for the existence of an exclusive common ancestor for the "Venus" group (Np42, Of15, OSe15, Pt2), distinct from the scriptorium master copy; but a wider analysis of the collections could well reveal one. In this connection, attention should be paid to the close similarity of the hands of Of15, OSe15 and Pt2, which to me suggests conscious mimicry of that of a common exemplar.

Notes