Note 32 — XVII.

Gallo-Belgicus was erroneously supposed, by the ingenious Mr. Reed, to be the "first news-paper published in England;" we are, however, assured by the author of the "Life of Ruddiman," that it has no title to so honourable a distinction. Gallo-Belgicus appears to have been rather an Annual Register, or History of its own Times, than a news-paper. It was written in Latin, and entitled. "Mercurij Gallo-Belgici: sive, rerum in Gallia, et Belgio potissimum: Hispania quoque, Italia, Anglia, Germania, Polonia. Vicinisque locis ab anno 1588, ad Martium anni 1594, gestarum, Nuncij." The first volume was printed in 8vo. at Cologne, 1598; from which year, to about 1605, it was published annually; and from thence to the time of its conclusion, which is uncertain, it appeared in half-yearly volumes. Chalmers' Life of Ruddiman, 1794. The great request in which newspapers were held at the publication of the present work, may be gathered from Burton, who, in his Anatomy of Melancholy, complains that "if any read now-a-days, it is a play-book, or a pamphlet of newes."