Note 7 — ORIGINAL PIECES.

“Lap.” This is plainly a misreading for “plate.” It would have been an unfriendly and unamiable wish had the author prayed that liquids, as soups and sauces were, should fall into the lap of his friend, of which it would naturally have been irretentive. It is easy to trace the corruption of the text. “Plate” has been written with an elision, “pla,” by a copyist studious of his ease. The now final vowel has slipped into the middle place and formed “pal;” which a careless scribe, putting the cart before the horse, has changed into “lap.”