ESSAYS AND ILLUSTRATIONS. No. I. JOHN BAGFORD *. JOHN BAGFORD was born in London, most probably some time in the year 1675; for in a volume of his "Collectanea," Harl. MSS. 5979, on a blank leaf, there is the following endorsement in Bagford's own hand-writing, with a black-lead pencil, John, son of John and Elizabeth Bagford, was baptized Oct. 31, 1675, in the parish of St. Anne, Black Friars." He was bred, it seems, to the business of a shoe-maker; for he acknowledges that he practised, or had practised, "the gentle * This article is principally given in the words of the Rev. Dr. John Calder; who, in his Annotations on the Tatler, says, "This writer, who, in the course of this work, is much oftener a transcriber than a commentator, has been indebted for much of the information in these notes to the collections of the ingenious and industrious Mr. John Bagford, and his singular care in preserving fugitive and perishable papers. He was certainly no very common man, and there is but little known of him in print. It is, therefore, but grateful in the Annotator, and it may be acceptable to some of his readers, to throw together such scattered memorials of this curious person as he has been able to collect, from the difficult reading of Mr. Bagford's own papers, or from other sources." + Most of the very many volumes in the British Museum, under the general title of " Bagford's Collectanea," consist of printed title-pages, advertisements, hand-bills, fugitive papers of all kinds, vignettes, prints, &c. pasted into paper books, sometimes with MS notes interspersed, but oftener without any. Bagford's MSS. properly so called, are comparatively few, intermixed with the numerous volumes above mentioned, and promiscuously arranged, and deposited along with them, in the department of MSS. Besides, there are very many MSS. in the game rich repository that have printed papers and tracts bound up with thein. craft," craft," as he calls it, in a little curious and entertaining tract on the fashions of shoes, &c. and the art of making them, which may be seen in the British Museum, Harl. MSS. 5911. It appears that he married, or at least that he was a father, pretty early in life; for there is, in the same Collection, a power of attorney from John Bagford junior to John Bagford senior, empowering him to claim and receive the wages of his son, as a seaman, in case of his death, dated in 1713, when the father could only have been of the age of 38 years. (See Harl. MSS. 5995.) He seems to have been led very early, by the turn of his mind, to enquire into the antiquities of his own country, and the origin and progress of its literature. By such enquiries he acquired a great knowledge of old English books, prints, and other literary curiosities, which he carefully picked up at low prices, and re-sold honestly on moderate profits. In this kind of curious but ungainly traffick, he seems to have spent much of his life; in the prosecution of it, he crossed the seas more than once, with abundance of commissions from intelligent booksellers, and curious people of learning and opulence, who, no doubt, contributed to his support; and there are very many of his bills among his papers in the British Museum, that vouch very strongly for his great skill in purchasing, and his great reasonableness in selling, various sorts of uncommon things. this while he appears to have been a book-broker, rather than a book-seller, and a most proper and honest person to employ in the purchase of scarce and curious publications, prints, &c. on moderate terms. It is evident that he had been at very extraordinary pains to inform himself in the history of printing, and of all the arts immediately, or more remotely, connected with it. He published, in the Philosophical Transactions, in 1707, his Proposals for a History of Printing, Printers, Illuminators, Chalcography, Paper-making, &c. &c. On subscription 10s.; and 10s. more on the delivery of a volume in folio, containing about 200 All sheets." sheets." These Proposals were printed on a halfsheet, with a specimen on another, containing the life of William Caxton, first printer in the Abbey of Westminster, with a list of his books. There are several copies of these Proposals in the British Museum, Harl. MSS. 5995. Whoever will take the trouble of examining the numerous volumes of Mr. Bagford's MSS. on this subject, now in the British Museum, will be thoroughly convinced that he was well qualified for his undertaking, though he wrote a bad hand, and spelt very ill. Destitute as he appears to have been of the benefit of a liberal education, by his great ingenuity and industry he seems to have acquired a degree of accurate knowledge, that, all things considered, is really wonderful. At his death these MSS. were purchased by Mr. Humphrey Wanley, lord Oxford's librarian, for his Lordship's library, and came in course with the Harleian MSS. into the British Museum. It has been said that there are more of this curious man's collections for the same purpose in the Public Library at Cambridge; and that they have never been opened since they came there. But we have the authority of the late worthy master of Emanuel College, to assert, that this is not a fact. It would, indeed, have been a reproach to so curious and inquisitive a man as Dr. Farmer, to have had such papers in his custody, without the curiosity to inspect them. Mr. Bagford did not confine himself solely to the theory of printing: it appears, likewise, that he practised the art, by two cards, printed on the frozen river Thames, Jan. 18, 1715-16, among the Harl. MSS. 5936. In the first of these cards, he is styled "Dr. John Bradford *, patron of printing, Jan. 2, 1715-16. Printed at his Majesty's printing-office in Black-Friars." Round this card are prints of the heads of Gottenburg and W. Caxton, with other devices, the royal arms, and the city of London I copy Dr. Calder's words; but this first card could scarcely have been intended for Bagford. below, below, &c. (Harl. MSS. 5936.) The second card is as follows: "The noble art and mystery of printing, being invented and practised by John Gottenburg, a soldier at Harlem in Holland, anno 1440, King Hen. VI. anno 1459, sent two private messengers, with 1500 marks, to procure one of the workmen. They prevailed on one Frederick Corsellis to leave the printing-office in disguise, who immediately came over with them, and first instructed the English in this famous art, at Oxford, the same year, 1459." In the area of the card, in capital letters, "Mr. John Bagford," and the four following lines: "All you that walk upon the Thames, May see what things upon the Thames were done. The very curious and well-written letter of this ingenious man to Mr. Hearne, printed in the first volume of the second edition of "Leland's Collectanea," p. 58, & seqq. relative to London, and the antiquities in its vicinity, does Mr. Bagford very great honour. He seems to have been much employed and respected by Lord Oxford, Dr. John Moore, first bishop of Norwich, afterwards of Ely, Sir Hans Sloane, Sir James Austins, Mr. Clavel, &c.; and it is said, that for having enriched the famous library of his patron Bishop Moore with many curiosities, his Lordship procured him an admission into the Charter-house, as a pensioner on that foundation, in the cemetery of which he was buried. He died at Islington, May 15, 1716, aged 65. In 1728, a print of him was engraved, by Mr. George Vertue, from a picture by Mr. Howard. * Of Printing on the Thames, see vol. I. p. 119. + Purchased at his death by King George the First, and given by him to the University of Cambridge. In Noble's Continuation of Granger, vol. II. p. 91, are two excellent Epigrams, occasioned by this donation. VOL. II. HH No. II. No. II. GEORGE BALLARD. THIS Mr. BALLARD was a most extraordinary person: he was bred in low life, a stay-maker, or woman's habit-maker, at Campden* in Gloucestershire; but, having a turn for letters, and in particular towards the Saxon learning, he became acquainted, from a similarity of study, with Mrs. Elstob, after she was settled at Evesham. By the assistance of the Rev. Mr. Talbot, vicar of Keinton in Warwickshire, and a recommendation to Dr. Jenner, President of Magdalen College, Oxon, he removed to that University. The President appointed him one of the eight clerks of his college, which furnished him with chambers and commons; and, thus being a Gremial, he was afterward elected, by the procurement of the President, one of the beadles of the University. He was of a weak and sickly constitution; which determined his parents to put him to the above trade of a habitmaker, as an easy business not requiring much bodily strength. The time he took up in learning the Saxon language was stolen from sleep, after his day's labour was over. The communicator of this article celebrated with him a festival, which he held for his friends, on having completed a transcript of a Saxon Dictionary, which he borrowed of Mr. Browne Willis, being not able to purchase it, and which he had improved with the addition of near a thousand words, col * Among the benefactors to the church and poor of Campden, is Mr. John Ballard, physician of Western-sub-edge (as by the inscription on his tomb 1678); who was elder brother to George Ballard's grandfather Thomas. Samuel Ballard died July 8, 1710, æt. 46; and Elizabeth, his wife, July 10, 1744, æt. 73. These, probably, were his father and mother. lected |