The Value Which Smollett Put Upon Accuracy In The Smallest
Matters Of Detail Is Evinced By The Corrections Which He Made In
The Margin Of A Copy Of The 1766 Edition Of The Travels.
These
corrections, which are all in Smollett's own and unmistakably
neat handwriting, may be divided into four categories.
In the
first place come a number of verbal emendations. Phrases are
turned, inverted and improved by the skilful "twist of the pen"
which becomes a second nature to the trained corrector of proofs;
there are moreover a few topographical corrigenda, suggested by
an improved knowledge of the localities, mostly in the
neighbourhood of Pisa and Leghorn, where there is no doubt that
these corrections were made upon the occasion of Smollett's
second visit to Italy in 1770. [Some not unimportant errata were
overlooked. Thus Smollett's representation of the droit d'aubaine
as a monstrous and intolerable grievance is of course an
exaggeration. (See Sentimental Journey; J. Hill Burton, The Scot
Abroad, 1881, p. 135; and Luchaire, Instit. de France.) On his
homeward journey he indicates that he travelled from Beaune to
Chalons and so by way of Auxerre to Dijon. The right order is
Chalons, Beaune, Dijon, Auxerre. As further examples of the zeal
with which Smollett regarded exactitude in the record of facts we
have his diurnal register of weather during his stay at Nice and
the picture of him scrupulously measuring the ruins at Cimiez
with packthread.] In the second place come a number of English
renderings of the citations from Latin, French, and Italian
authors. Most of these from the Latin are examples of Smollett's
own skill in English verse making. Thirdly come one or two
significant admissions of overboldness in matters of criticism,
as where he retracts his censure of Raphael's Parnassus in Letter
XXXIII. Fourthly, and these are of the greatest importance, come
some very interesting additional notes upon the buildings of
Pisa, upon Sir John Hawkwood's tomb at Florence, and upon the
congenial though recondite subject of antique Roman hygiene. [Cf.
the Dinner in the manner of the Ancients in Peregrine Pickle,
(xliv.) and Letters IX. to XL in Humphry Clinker.]
After Smollett's death his books were for the most part sold for
the benefit of his widow. No use was made of his corrigenda. For
twenty years or so the Travels were esteemed and referred to, but
as time went on, owing to the sneers of the fine gentlemen of
letters, such as Walpole and Sterne, they were by degrees
disparaged and fell more or less into neglect. They were
reprinted, it is true, either in collective editions of Smollett
or in various collections of travels; [For instance in Baldwin's
edition of 1778; in the 17th vol. of Mayor's Collection of
Voyages and Travels, published by Richard Phillips in twenty-eight
vols., 1809; and in an abbreviated form in John Hamilton
Moore's New and Complete Collection of Voyages and Travels
(folio, Vol. 11. 938-970).] but they were not edited with any
care, and as is inevitable in such cases errors crept in,
blunders were repeated, and the text slightly but gradually
deteriorated.
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