[To THE EDITOR OF THE "SPECTATOR.")
Sfa,—Your editorial note appended to my letter on this subject, in which you object that the extract on which I commented is given by me "between inverted commas, but it ought not to be so given, for although almost all quotation it is a mere string of sentences separated from other matter equally important to the understanding of the whole case,"—would seem to suggest, however unintentionally on your part, that I had laid myself open to the grave charge of quoting unfairly. But my comments, well or 171 founded, as different persons may think them, were professedly based on the Report of
the Committee of Governors, as published in the Times,—the only report coming within my cognisance, as one of the general public. My extract, a somewhat lengthy one, was one entire piece of writing, constituting about the middle-third of the report. As sent to you, it was cut and pasted out of the Times, without the omission or alteration by me of a letter or a comma ; and being wholly one continuous quotation, was included by me, I venture to think not improperly, between quotation marks. In my own view, it constituted further the pith of the report, the earlier third being chiefly introductory, and the later third chiefly recom- mendatory; but, of course, 1 have no right of complaint that on this, or on any other points of the case—the natural bias of the Governors' Committee, the significance of their admissions, and the reasonableness of their conclusions, for example--your view should be different from mine, which, with your usual well-known fairness to the other side, you have so readily allowed me to set forth, in opposition to your own.--I am, Sir, &c., WILLIAM °DUNG, M.A., M.B., F.R.S. Oxford, August 11th.
[In that case, the Times, of course, summarised, without giving any hint that it was summarising; and to our mind, did not summarise adequately.—En. Spectator.]
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