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Gentleman's Magazine 1818 part 1 p.329

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  Drunken Barnaby's Journal

Drunken Barnaby's Journal

book review
Barnabee Itinerarium; or, Barnabee's Journal. The Seventh Edition: to which are prefixed, an Account of the Author, now first discovered; a Bibliographical History of former Editions of the Work; and Illustrative Notes. London, printed for J. Harding, 1818. 12 mo.
'The best serious piece of Latin in modern metre,' says the Quarterly Reviewer, 'is Sir Francis Kinaston's Amores Troili et Cressidae, a translation of the two first books of Chaucer's poem; but it was reserved for famous BARNABY to employ the barbarous ornament of rhyme, so as to give thereby point and character to good Latinity,'
No XXXV. p.32.
THIS celebrated and popular poem, commonly known by the name of Drunken Barnaby's Journal, was first published without a date - probably, as the Editor thinks, about 1650. The Second Edition was in 1716, small 8vo. and took the name of Drunken Barnaby's Four Journeys to the North of England. The Third Edition was in 1723, small 8vo. The Fourth in 1786, small 8vo. The Fifth in April 1805, 8vo. The Sixth in Sept. of the same year.
In the Second Edition a conjecture was made, that the Author was one Barnaby Harrington, an airy being, of whose earthly existence not one atom of proof has been even attempted. The present indefatigable Editor, MR. HASLEWOOD, had already gone the length of printing the text, and sending his Preface to the Printer, on the 10th of October last, when a passage in the Itinerary rendering necessary a reference to one of the numerous publications of a forgotten poet of that day, delivered at once to his delighted eye, the secret of the Author of Barnabee's Journal, in characters which neither left any doubt in his mind, nor can leave any doubt in the mind of any one capable of weighing the force of circumstantial evidence of identity: at least it cannot do so when accompanied by the additional coincidences which the pursuit of the same clue afterwards unfolded.
This forgotten poet was no other than RICHARD BRATHWAYTE, born 1588, who died 1673, aged 83, and whose productions bear date from 1611 to 1665. Richard Brathwayte at the end of his Strappado for the Divell, 1615, has an apology for the errata, on account of 'the intricacy of the copy, and the absence of the Author from many important proofs,' &c. This is the express apology at the end of Barnabee's Journal, that the copy was obscure; neither was the Author, by reason of his distance, and employments of higher consequence, made acquainted with the publishing of it. &c. Similar apologies occur in Brathwayte's English Gentleman, 1630 - his English Gentlewoman, 1631 - his Essays upon the Five Senses, 1635, &c. Even all the capitals and rule ornaments used in the First Edition of Baranabee;s Journal (and several are of rather peculiar character) are found in a little work by Brathwayte, nearly contemporary, printed by J. H. - probably John Haviland.
Having got thus far, let us compare the recorded facts of Brathwayte's life with those which Barnabee relates of himself. Barnabee says,

'Veni Applebie, ubi natus,
Primam sedem comitatus.'
Brathwayte was the son of Thomas Brathwayte, of Warcop, near Appleby. (Wood indeed says that the poet was born in Northumberland; but the neighbourhood of his father's seat is a much more probable place,) The next coincidence is still stronger.
Barnabee says,

'Veni Nesham, Dei donum,
In Coenobiarchae domum,
Uberem vallem, salubrem venam,
Cursu fluminis amoenam,
Laetam sylvis, et frondosam,
Herae vultu speciosam.

Veni Darlington, prope vicum
Conjugem duxi peramicam;
Nuptiis celebrantur festa,
Nulla admittuntur moesta,' &c.
'Thence
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