The running titles at the top of the columns in each page, how trifling a circumstance soever it may appear, required no small degree of thought and attention. Many of the proper names being left untranslated, whose etymology was necessary to be known, in order to a more perfect comprehension of the allusions in the text, the translation of them, under the inspection of the above named Committee, has been, for the benefit of the unlearned, supplied in the margin. Some obvious and material errors in the chronology have been considered and rectified.

The marginal references, even in Bishop Lloyd's Bible, had in many places suffered by the inaccuracy of the press: subsequent editions have copied those errata, and added many others of their own; so that it became absolutely necessary to turn to and compare the several passages, which has been done in every single instance, and, by this precaution, several false references were brought to light, which would otherwise have passed unsuspected. It has been the care of the Editor to rectify these, as far as he could, by critical conjecture, where the copies universally failed him, as they did in most of the errors discovered in Bishop Lloyd's edition. In some few instances he confesses himself to have been at a loss in finding out the true reference, though the corruption was manifest in the want of any, even the most distant resemblance between the passages compared together. Cases of this sort, indeed, did not often occur; so that a very small number only of the old references are, with the sanction of the Committee, omitted, and their places more usefully supplied.

It has been suggested by the late Archbishop of Canterbury, that an improvement might be made in the present editions of the Bible, by taking in a number of additional references, of which many useful ones, as he supposed, might be furnished from other editions referred to by him, and particularly from a Scotch edition, of which the present Vice-Chancellor was kind enough to lend a copy. The references found in it, which were indeed very numerous, having been severally turned to and examined, such of them were selected as the Editor judged most pertinent, together with others that occurred from his own reading and observation. In doing this he has endeavoured to keep clear of mere fanciful illusions, of which too many presented themselves in the before-named Scotch edition, and to adhere as near as possible to the plan

N. S. No. 85.

marked out in the former collection made by Bishop Lloyd, pointing out such passages chiefly where the same history or the same name were introduced, the same matter treated of, or sentiment expressed, or at least where parallels might fairly be drawn; and sometimes where a similar use of a particular word or expression tended to illustrate the ap plication of it, on another occasion. The number of references being thus augmented considerably, the collection upon the whole will, it is hoped, be regarded as useful in the light of a concordance, material as well as verbal, always at hand.

In this state the quarto copy was sent to press, and the first proofs carefully collated with the copy, both text and margin; after which the second proofs were again read, and generally speaking, the third likewise; not to mention the frequent revisions of proofs besides, which

are

common in correcting the press. This proved indeed a very tiresome and tedious task, but was not more than was absolutely necessary in order to attain the degree of accuracy that was wished. A particular attention was required with respect to the figures belonging to the marginal references, where errors were continually creeping in after a manner that would appear highly astonishing to those who have never been concerned in correcting multitudes of figures as they came from the press.

When the quarto sheets were printed off, the forms were lengthened out in order to make up the folio edition; in doing which, the parts were often so jumbled together, and such confusion introduced, by misplacing the references and mistaking the chronology, that nothing else would suffice than a fresh collation of the whole with the quarto copy, and a repetition of almost the same trouble and care in the revisal, and in making up the running titles anew, as had been used before. But the Editor thinks he has just reason to congratulate himself on the opportunity hereby given him of discovering and correcting some few trivial inaccuracies, which, in spite of all his vigilance, had escaped his notice in the quarto edition; so that the folio edition is rendered, by this, somewhat the more perfect of the two, and therefore more fit to be recommended for a standard copy. The Editor humbly hopes this account of his proceedings will not be unacceptable to the Board, and will think his time and pains not ill bestowed, if he shall have succeeded in his desire of giving satisfaction to those who honoured him with the employment,

E

found gross corruptions, particularly where they have changed for Roman characters, whereby words have been attributed to God which he never spoke!"

3dly, The alterations in the contents and running titles.

These notes, it must be confessed, often supply something like scholia, explanatory, or leading observations; and although in a country where there exists a large body of dissenters, it is scarcely right that the public version of the Holy Scriptures should be burdened with the running glosses of the translators; yet, as their theological opinions are known to have been in accordance with the majority of those Nonconformists, it becomes a matter of no small interest to them, as well as to all churchmen attached to the doctrines of the Reformation, to see what the character of these

"considerable alterations" really is, lest there should be found a serious departure from the opinions of the translators.

Nor can I omit to remark, 4thly, On the increase of the marginal references.

I do not pretend to judge of their merits, which, for aught I know, may be very great; but when I find that they have "augmented considerably," I see that, in the same degree, "the authorised version" has been extended.

It is not my intention farther to Occupy your attention at this time, but I shall venture again to invite your readers to consider the present state of the English Bible, which I believe, in many important respects, varies from those original editions which, for the purposes of accuracy, were placed under the special custody of the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge,

β

On the 6th August, 1830, at halfpast ten o'clock at night, I reached home after a journey to N., where I had been on business connected with my vocation. On arriving, I found P.C. at my house; he had already retired to rest, for, having found me absent, it was his intention to set off very early the next morning on his return home. My wife was not yet gone to bed, and C. got up immediately, in order to consult with me on some subjects of great moment.

It was not long ere our discourse turned upon the all-absorbing topic of the cholera morbus,

for an official report had conveyed the intelligence that that disease had broken out in Astrachan, that it was spreading widely and rapidly. Medical aid was in great demand. Scarely had this news reached us, when it was followed by accounts, that already the pestilence, which was of a very malignant character, was advancing with the speed of lightning from the south, along the banks of the Volga to this government, just as, the preceding year, it had pursued its course from the east. In the like rapid succession came the information, that already the

malady had appeared in Zarizin and Duborka.

Not suspecting that the angel of death was approaching so near their own locality, the vice-governor, the head of the medical department, the surgeon and the physician of the hospital, all took their departure for the scene of danger. However, on the evening of the 6th, it was currently reported, that three persons, who were travelling by water from Astrachan, had been seized with the distemper and conveyed to the Hospital in this place.

On the 7th of August these individuals all died; several others fell ill; and such was the deadly and quickly fatal character of these attacks, that a paralyzing shock pervaded the minds of all, more especially of those who resided in the second district of the town, which was immediately situated upon the banks of the Volga. But already, on the following day, the distemper attacked several of the residents of the third and first districts; and it was reported that the hospital was so overwhelmed with the sick, that it was utterly impossible to receive any more. After suffering from vomiting, purging, and spasms, the skin of the patients assumed a blueish tint, and in the course of six or twelve hours, without the least hope of rescue, they expired.

So quickly and unexpectedly did the disease come upon us, that the slightest precautions were not even thought of. The vice-governor, together with the majority of the physicians, were absent for the purpose of opposing the disease in the distance, and preventing its approach to Saratoff. Unfortunately, however, it was already there, before any sanative

measures had been taken, and even before it was known in what manner it should be treated. At first no credit was given, either to the imminence of the danger, or the infectious nature of the distemper; at present, however, the malignity of the disease has proclaimed itself by the number of the victims, and all the physicians say, "This malady possesses, indeed, something infectious in its character, and is not merely epidemical, but also contagious; if not, why were so many villages on the Volga entirely free from it, while scarcely any individual at Saratoff, who suffered from disease, had not to complain of his sufferings being augmented by attacks bearing a great affinity to cholera. At the commencement of its appearance amongst us, those of the lower orders who were attacked, were taken by force and dragged to the hospital. The head physician had been summoned away; his representative knew but little of the locality of the hospital; there was a want of room, of assistance, and nurses, as also a dearth of prepared medicines for the continually increasing number of the infected. Our physicians might have been very well acquainted with the cholera in its general character, but the disease which prevailed here, and the essential nature of it, together with its remedies, must have been unknown to them, for what had been reported to have prevailed against the cholera in other places, was not of the slightest use here. The patients were bled; they were given sweet mercury and liquid opium: all kinds of embrocations were rubbed into them; but, at its first commencement, no one who was attacked escaped death. I have witnessed the punctual and prompt use of

the means prescribed, yet no one was saved who had been attacked with the whole energy of this malignant disease, for, during the four first days, the four attendant physicians (two of whom died here, the other two, one on his journey from, and the other at Zarizin) were seized with the distemper, and after having been bled, with spasms, and tortured with excessive diarrhoea; and notwithstanding every means were applied, one of them died immediately. Fear and trembling, terror and dejection, were soon diffused among the inhabitants. Those who could leave the town fled; and as the disease was not as yet considered infectious, those who fled were themselves allowed to disperse unmolested through the adjacent villages. The majority of respectable persons who held no official capacity also retired into the country, and almost all servants, journeymen, and daily labourers and other Russians, Germans, and Tartars, who were not absolutely settled in the place, fled. On the 7th August my congregation amounted to 550 individuals, but on the 10th of the same month it had, at least, decreased nearly 150. When the instructions given by the authorities to the police began to be executed, they literally and roughly enough obeyed them, by entering every house, demanding if there were any sick, seizing those of the lower classes, and dragging them to the hospital, where, as it was reported, there was no help nor attendance, and that all died. To escape this calamity, with terror and anxiety our poor colonists fled from the town into the surrounding villages. Many died on the way, and the distemper thereby spread itself still farther around.

From the 7th to the 20th of August the disease increased with alarming rapidity and violence, exhibiting the same deadly cha racter. Two hundred and sixty persons were, it was said, at the commencement, daily cut off by this horrible scourge. In the same ratio as the mortality increased it also began to decrease. Up to the 30th of August 2,170 persons are reported to have died. It was no till the 26th of August that we began to breathe more freely, and that a renovated feeling of security cheered our jaded spirits. But even up to this day, the 31st of August, we do not feel ourselves completely delivered from this visitation, though it is evidently on the decline.

We

Throughout the whole of July and the commencement of August an almost insupportable dry heat prevailed here by day, but though in the night time it was exceed. ingly cool in the open air, in our dwellings we lay in a profuse and continued perspiration, which escaped from the pores in streams; and we were dreadfully tormented and oppressed with thirst. were very seldom visited with storms, and the rain delayed to fall, and even when a passing shower fell, the glowing atmosphere speedily absorbed it and dried the earth again. Thus predisposed for the reception of this malady, it was conveyed by some shipwrights over the Caspian Sea to Astrachan, Buritzin, Dubowka, and Saratoff. Some of the same class of men, two of whom were known to be infected, brought the Cholera somewhat later into the farther colony, situated on the mountain side of the Volga, where David Quint and several others died of it. In the same manner also, in the preceding year, the