Note 16 — I. HUMOROUS.

This is the date suggested by Professor Fraser, but it is purely conjectural. Sheriff Strathern, in a paper on “Chapman Literature,” read to the Glasgow Archæological Society on 6th April, 1865, regards this production as the earliest of Graham’s prose publications, and says “it was published in 1783.” This, too, would seem to be conjectural. Graham was in his grave four years before that date, and it is hardly likely that this, the most important of his prose writings, was not in print during his lifetime. The year suggested by Fraser is probably nearer the truth.