Note 100 — THE NORTHUMBERLAND MANUSCRIPT

“To Algernoun, Lord Percy,” the Earl’s son and heir, whom he addresses as “My right noble Pupill and joy of my heart,” Davies writes, “The Italian hand I teach you.” Would that he could have taught it to William Shakspere of Stratford! It was in his time, says Mr. Dowse, “fast superseding the old court-hand.” It was, certainly, fast superseding the old German, or “Old English,” hand in which Shakspere wrote. And the author of Twelfth Night must have known the value of that Italian hand which was at that time rapidly “winning its way in cultured society,” as Sir Sidney Lee tells us, for does not he make Malvolio say, “I think we do know the sweet Roman hand”? But Mr. Dowse does not seem to have known the meaning of the term “court-hand,” which is a technical term for the scripts employed by lawyers in drawing up charters and other legal documents, and can very seldom be described as “beautiful.”