25 NOVEMBER 1899, Page 14

A CORRECTION.

[TO THE EDITOR OF THE "SPECTATOR."]

SIR,—In your issue of November 11th the question is put, 1 Was it Parr or Porson who knew as much Greek as a Greek cobbler P" It was said of neither of these scholars, but of Joshua Barnes, Regius Professor of Greek at Cam- bridge at the beginning of the last century, of whom no less a person than the great Bentley declared that " he understood Greek as well as an Athenian cobbler." Barnes wrote a pamphlet to prove that the real author of the Iliad was