Errors Of The Press.

ERRORS OF THE PRESS .

( Continued from Page 107 . ) 4 N important house in New York had occasion to advertise for f \_ salu a quantity of brass hoppers , such as are used in coffee mills . But instead of hrass hoppers , thc newspaper read , " grasshoppers . " During the Mexican War , one of the newspapers hurriedly announced an important item of news from Mexico , that General

Pillow and thirty-seven of his men had heen lost in a bottle ( battle ) . An American paper thus speaks of a self-made man : — " He arrived in California twenty years ago with only one shirt fco his back ; and since then ho has contrived , by close application to business , to accumulate over ten millions . "

The American and Continental Monthly , in a curious paper on blunders , gives the following cases : — " A publisher offered a hundred dollars for the best tail for his paper ; a grocer advertised an invoice of boxes of pigs from Smyrna ; and a New York landlord a louse to let , and possession given immediately . "

Lawyer Benham , of the old Cincinnati Bar , was an orator , and very fond of showing off his classical learning before a jury . In a murder trial , in defending the prisoner , lie warned tho jury not to allow public opinion , which was against his client , to influence their verdict . " Gentlemen of the jury , " ho said , in concluding his appeal , " give up , drop entirely all feeling in this

important matter , and bo like the ancient Roman in his adherence to tho truth , who , in its defence , most eloquently declared , ' Amicus Cato , amicus Plato , amicus Cicero , sed major Veritas . ' " The next morning the lawyer found himself reported in the newspapers as follows : — " ' I may cuss Cato , I may euss Plato , I may cuss Cicero , ' said Major Veritas . "

Tho Baron do Grimm , in his " Memoirs , " mentions the extraordinary circumstance of an irritable French author , who died in a fit of angpr , because a favourite work , which he had himself revised with great caro , had been printed oil with upwards of threo hundred typographical errors ; half of which had been made by the corrector of tho press .

A Paris printer named Stephens , in order to secure perfect accuracy in his books , used to exhibit proof-sheets for public inspection—offering a reward to anyone who could detect an error in them , so that it might be rectified before printing . Yefc one of his editions of thc Testament is known as the " Pulres Edition , " from the Latin word " plures" being mis-spelled , owing to the transposition of tie letter 1 .

The wrath of the great Napoleon was once fearfully kindled against the Imperial printing office , because in a bulletin , by a misprint of voleur for valeur , the Grand Army was described as performing deeds of tremendous theft instead of valour . The outraged warrior could only be pacified by a personal inspection of the compositor ' s case , it being explained to him thafc the o ' s being placed above the a ' s , the offending letter o had dropped among the a ' s by accident .

Napoleon's nephew was also the ' viefcim of a printer's error . Tho historian Kinglake tells us thafc when the Second Empire was established , it was the intention of Louis Napoleon to simply style himself "Napoleon , " but just before the coup d'etat , a

minister of the Home Office , busy preparing provincial sentiment , wrote " Juc le mot d ' ordre soit vive Napoleon !!! " The printer took the exclamations for III ., the proclamation went out , was copied by the newspapers , there was no time for explanation , and the nephew of his uncle adopted the title .

. A Cologne newspaper once announced that " Switchman Schultz was caught by the wheels of a locomotive yesterday , and was instantly killed . A similiar accident befell him last year . " A parallel incident is recorded of an Irishman named Gaff . An American editor ' s obituary notice of a lady was intended to read : — " It is feared that her husband will not be able to bear her demise . " The announcement appeared in print in thc following ludicrous form : — " It is feared that her husband will not be able to

wear her chemise . Ben Jonson was once asked to revise a sermon which was full of typographical errors ; but he declined the task , wittily remarking that ifc should be sent to the House of Correction . Thomas Carlyle went one day to a printer , urging him to expedite a work of his which was in hand . " Why , sir , " said the printer , " you are really so hard upon us with your corrections .

They take up so much time . " The Sage of Chelsea replied thafc he had had works printed in Scotland without so much delay . " Yes , indeed , sir , " answered the printer , " we are aware of that . We have a man here from Edinburgh , who , when he took up a bit of your copy , dropped it like a red hot cinder , and cried out , ' Oh , preserve us , have you got fchat man to print for ? Goodness only knows when ho will be done with his corrections . ' "

Burke , the celebrated orator , was careless in regard to his M . S . ; for one of his most spirited effusions received so many corrections and interlineations that the compositors refused to correct it , preferring to take down the types and re-set thc whole . The manuscript of thc late Dean Stanley was very illegible , and it is therefore no wonder that one of his works contained an amusing printer's mistake , " the hoins of the burning beast" appearing instead of " the thorn of the burning bush . "

Dr . Robert Chambers says of Sir Walter Scott that "he was a rapid writer , but he was nofc correct . In his manuscript , sentences were often left unfinished , and much oi his poetry is as slovenly as his prose . He did not even read over what he had written before sending it to the press . "

Robert Burns on the other hand was very painstaking in his corrections , and Milton evinced great anxiety in this respect . Ovid cared nothing about correcting , whereas Virgil spent eleven years in correcting the iEneid ; Shakespeare , it is stated , never altered a line ; Addison used the utmost care in his corrections ; but Steele was just the opposite to him .

Errors Of The Press.

Mr . John Randall , writing in the Notes and Queries . ( 1890 ) , says : — " When the subject of printers' errors is being discussed , it ought in fairness to be borne in mind that if a writer makes a slip and it is detected by fche printer , the error is corrected by the author , and fcho public knows nothing about it . When , on the

other hand , the printer makes a mistake , it is multiplied many times , and a thousand people may independently discover one error . If authors would take the trouble fco write more distinctly when treating of difficult subjects and mentioning proper names , printers errors would bo fewer . "

" Book of Rarities , " by Bro . Edward Roberts P . M . Asst . Prov . G . T . ( To be continued . ) One of the most cheering signs of the times is the sympathetic attitude now adopted towards ladies by Freemasonry . For long the two were supposed to be

antagonistic . There is a legend that a lady whose husband was a Freemason hid herself in an eight-day clock which stood in the lodge-room , to find out the secrets , and only escaped the just penalty for such hardihood by the assembled brethren acceding to the tearful

request of her spouse to initiate her into the mysteries in order to preserve them inviolate . But ia the present day Freemasons are much more bending to women—if the latter content themselves with less inqnisitiveness—than formerly . The other day a lady was selected to lay the

foundation-stone of a new Masonic Hall in the South-West of England , and on Saturday the Gallery Lodgewhich may be considered the centre of literary Freemasonry—gave what was called a " Ladies' Night" in Anderton ' s Hotel , when the wives , sisters , and aunts of

members were entertained to all the conviviality and none of the mystery which the Order commands . This augurs well for the future . It is even whispered among outsiders that part of the mystic ceremony—in which only the initiated can take part—consists in singing a rollicking ditty of which the refrain is :

No moral can more the ladies adore Than a free and an accepted Mason . This , however , may be only rumour ; the fact remains that ladies are gradually making their way into Freemasonry . —Daily Telegraph .

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