In The Droomme of Doomes Day.  By
George Gascoigne (1576) is:—­

``An Aduertisement of the Prynter to the Reader.

``Understand (gentle Reader) that whiles this worke was in the presse it pleased God to visit the translatour thereof with sicknesse.  So that being unable himselfe to attend the dayly proofes, he apoynted a seruaunt of his to ouersee the same.  Who being not so well acquainted with the matter as his maister was, there haue passed some faultes much contrary unto both our meanings and desires.  The which I have therefore collected into this Table.  Desiring every Reader that wyll vouchsafe to peruse this booke, that he will firste correct those faultes and then judge accordingly.’’

A particularly interesting note on this point precedes the list of errata in Stanyhurst’s Translation of Virgil’s _AEneid_ (1582), p 92which was printed at Leyden.  Mr. F. C. Birkbeck Terry, who pointed this out in Notes and Queries, quoted from Arber’s reprint, p. 157:—­

``John Pates Printer to thee Corteous Reader, I am too craue thy pacience and paynes (good reader) in bearing wyth such faultes as haue escapte in printing:  and in correcting as wel such as are layd downe heere too thy view, as all oother whereat thou shalt hap too stumble in perusing this treatise.  Thee nooueltye of imprinting English in theese partes and thee absence of the author from perusing soome proofes could not choose but breede errours.’’

Certainly Scot, Gascoigne, and Stanyhurst did not correct the proofs, but it would not have been necessary to make an excuse if the practice was not a pretty general one among authors.

Bishop Babington’s Exposition of the Lord’s Prayer (1588) contains an excuse for the author’s inability to correct the press:—­

``If thou findest any other faultes either in words or distinctions troubling a perfect sence (Gentle Reader) helpe them by thine p 93owne judgement and excuse the presse by the Authors absence, who best was acquainted to reade his owne hande.’’

In the Bobleian Library is preserved the printer’s copy of Book V. of Hooker’s Ecclesiastical Polity (1597), with Whitgift’s signature and corrections in Hooker’s handwriting.  On one of the pages is the following note by the printer:—­

``Good Mr. Hooker, I pray you be so good as to send us the next leaf that followeth this, for I know not by what mischance this of ours is lost, which standeth uppon the finishing of the book.’’[7]

     [7] Notes and Queries, 7th Series, viii. 73.

Another proof of the general practice will be found in N. Breton’s The Wit of Wit (1599):—­

``What faultes are escaped in the printing, finde by discretion, and excuse the Author by other worke that let him from attendance to the Presse; non ha! che non sa!.  N. B. Gent.’’

At the end of Nash’s dedication ``To his Readers,’’ Lenten Stuffe (1599), is this p 94interesting statement:  ``Apply it for me for I am called away to correct the faults of the press, that escaped in my absence from the printing house.’’