Chapter Erragon to Errors of Authors of E by Brewer's Readers Handbook

(28) Higgons (Bevil) says—

The Cyprian queen, drawn by Apellês’ hand,
Of perfect beauty did the pattern stand!
But then bright nymphs from every part of Greece
Did all contribute to adorn the piece.
   —To Sir Godfrey Kneller (1780).

Tradition says that Apellês model was either Phrynê, or Campaspê afterwards his wife. Campbell has borrowed these lines, but ascribes the painting to Protogenês the Rhodian—

When first the Rhodian’s mimic art arrayed
The Queen of Beauty in her Cyprian shade,
The happy master mingled in the piece
Each look that charmed him in the fair of Greece.
   —Pleasures of Hope, ii.

(29) Hogg the Ettrick shepherd, speaks of “Evening Mass,” and sir Walter Scott says, “On Christmas Eve the Mass was sung.”

The supper-bell at court had rung,
The Mass was said, the Vespers sung.
   —The Queen’s Wake.

(30) Howitt, in his History of England

(George III., p. 241), describing the attack of the Gordon rioters on the Bank of England, says, “They [the rioters] found a mine of wealth guarded by ‘Arimaspians’ in the shape of infantry, who had orders to fire, and did it without scruple.” Now, the Arimaspians were the rioters, and the infantry were the “Griffins” who guarded the gold.

The tale is this: The Griffins guarded the gold of the north, but the Arimaspians, a one-eyed race, mounted on horseback, attempted to steal the gold, and hence arose the hostility between the griffin and the horse.

(31) Hume (Fergus). In The Mystery of a Hansom Cab (ch. ix. p. 56) we are told that the clock was too slow. At p. 131 (ch. xix.) Albert Pendy, the clock-and watchmaker, on being sworn, deposed that “it was ten minutes too fast,” and he adds, “I put it right.” Careton, addressing the jury (p. 135), says it was too slow.

(32) Johnson (Dr.) makes Addison speak of Steele as “Little Dicky,” whereas the person so called by Addison was a dwarfish actor who played “Gomez” in Dryden’s Spanish Fryar. He defines “Pastern, the knee of a horse” in his Dictionary.

(33) Kingsley (Charles). In Westward Ho! (ch. xx.) John Brumblecombe reads before the sea-fight the prayer for “all conditions of men;” but in the time of queen Elizabeth there was no such prayer in the Prayer-book.

(34) Lamb (Charles) speaks of pheasants being served up at table on the second of September. Partridges might, but pheasants are not eaten before October. He says, in his Essays of Elia, “Shrove Tuesday was helping the second of September to … the delicate thigh of a hen pheasant.”—Rejoicings upon the New Year’s Coming of Age.

(35) London Newspaper (A), one of the leading journals of the day, has spoken three times within two years of “passing under the Caudine Forks,” evidently supposing them to be a “yoke,” instead of a valley or mountain pass.

(36) Longfellow calls Erigena a Scotchman, whereas the very word means an Irishman.

Done into Latin by that Scottish beast,
Erigena Johannes.
   —Golden Legend.

Without doubt, the poet mistook John Duns [Scottus], who died in 1308, for John Scottus [Erigena], who died in 875. Erigena translated into Latin St. Dionysius. He was latitudinarian in his views, and anything but “a Scottish beast” or Calvinist.