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I the Author do positively assert that “Bier” is the right word. If empty bottles are called “dead men,” surely it is not too bold a metaphor to style the shelf, which supports them, a Bottled Bier. If I had not made this positive declaration in my lifetime, it is pleasant to imagine what would have been the conjectural emendations of those learned, but yet unborn Doctors A. B. C. D. &c. if my Epistle should have been found in the corner of an old chest some centuries hence.

“Bottled Bier.” A mere mistake of the printer: for “Bier, read Beer.” Bottled Beer was a common article in the cellars of Gentlemen in the 19th century. Dr. A.

The reading proposed by Dr. A. is certainly right; Bottled Beer, or Porter, was not only a common beverage in those days, but it was an article of exportation; as appears by the Registers of the Custom-house, which by the kind permission of those patrons of Literature, the Lords of the Treasury, I have been permitted to search. It is strange how “Bier” should be found in three editions! Dr. B.

I agree with Dr. A. and Dr. B. in their happy emendation of the text. Had they attended to the Association of Ideas, they would not have been at a loss to trace the origin of the error. The words “carcases” and “catacombs” occur in the preceding lines, and the Editor's mistake of Bier for Beer was natural: it is evidently not a mistake of the printer. Dr. C.

I am at all times willing to pay every respect to the acuteness of a Dr. A. the sagacity of a Dr. B. and the profundity of a Dr. C. but as Bier is the reading of every edition, three of which were published in the Author's lifetime, I must think that it is right, and that Bier was the name of some liquor then in vogue, though now unknown. I am informed that upon digging near the spot, where the Old House stood, a bottle has lately been found with wires twisted over the neck of it: no doubt with an intention to confine the cork, and perhaps the “Bier” (for I never can consent to think it was “Beer”) was contained in such bottles. Dr. D.

Dr. D. is certainly correct. I have seen the bottle; it has an E. upon it, the initial of the owner of the house, and is now in the British Museum. The cork was not quite destroyed, and a little liquid was still remaining in the bottle. That never to be sufficiently admired Chemist Dr. G. is engaged in analysing it, and there can be little doubt of his discovering what were the ingredients of that (now unknown) liquor called “Bier.” Dr. F.

Oh! Shakespear, Brother Bard, if thou hadst used my precaution, Thou wouldst not so have suffered by Commentators!

My fashionable readers understand the meaning of this phrase.

Mediis horum verborum litteris omissis, Lector, viri clarissimi nomen habes, cui domûs clavis, absente magistro, cura est—Soly Cock. Soli alias Soly vulgaris est diminutio (quid non vulgus audet?) Solomonis. Non minus audax Poeta noster, et ævo et nomine Prior, Aristotelem, philosophorum vere Gallum, obtruncat, ut infra

Tho' the renowned Grecian Aristotle, and the moderns vary.

A learned Judge on the circuit observed to the Mayor of Bodmin, that the whole town appeared to have been built at one time. Why do you think so? said the Mayor: because it is all tumbling down together, replied the Judge.

In an attack made by the Spaniards in 1595 on the Inhabitants of Penzance, a Constable (vide Carew) was knocked down. In a second attack by some of the same nation, in 1810, a similar circumstance happened. Mr. Humphry R— Barber and Constable,

in defence of his pole official received several knocks on his pole natural, and, according to his own account, the blows made his “eyes strike fire.” If he had recollected the following line in Virgil he would have quoted it.—

Posterior pars vicorum sic dicitur. Eadem venusta et polita oratione utentes pro Asino dicimus Jack Bottom, Jack Behind, et alia similia.

Perhaps the new and splendid appearance of this neighbouring mansion first excited the envy of the Old House.

Euphoniæ causa. See Byshe's Art of Poetry. So in our English Lyrics, “Will you come to the fair O,” &c. &c.

This alludes to a celebrated composition by Mr. Colman, entitled “A First Floor, or Lodgings to Let.”

The Classical Reader will compare this with Brother Horace's description of the Blandusian fountain. Our Shoot appears the most pure: The fountain of Blandusia was “splendidior vitreo,” and it was a place of great chit-chat for the young women who filled their pitchers at it;—hence the beauty of the expression—

but the cattle of the neighbourhood were invited to its brink

Not so at the Shoot of Penzance; as may be seen by perusing “impositam ilicem” i.e. the Board which is fixed against the Wall.

Nothing, that can pollute, shall touch our pure stream! How different the Blandusian fountain, which was often stained with cabbage tops and goat's blood.

For this and many other improvements in the town thanks to Dr. Borlase, the present Mayor, A.D.1811.

An old name of Penzanee, as appears by the Liber Valorum.

Vocabulum “and” hoc loco non negligenter omissum est. Sicut apud Ægyptiacos Leo et Virgo unum animal formant, quod Sphinx nominatur, sic apud Penzantienses Kitty et Ben, uxor et maritus, uno nomine designantur, et unico splendore nitent.

Mason. Eng. Gard.

The spirit of reform is never more troublesome, than when it has a pyrotechnical turn. Furor arma ministrat. The fire-reformer seizes the poker, and chokes those, who were previously comfortable, (tho' in a news-room, as in the world, all cannot have front seats near the fire,) with dust, and smoke, and ashes.

This Letter appeared in the Cornwall Gazette, November 15th, 1803.