Notes to Chapter 122 Or the delay might have been caused by Simmons if he thought the new poem violated
the clause in Milton’s contract agreeing not to print “any other Booke or Manuscript of
the same tenor or subject [as Paradise Lost]” without Simmons’s consent. Also, if Milton
made substantial changes in the work after licensing, it would have to be submitted
again.
23 Stephen Dobranski, Milton, Authorship,and the Book Trade (Cambridge, 1999), 41–61,
persuasively argues that it would be almost impossible for this omission to be a printer’s
error in setting the original text, though these lines might have been overlooked had
they been submitted on a loose page.
24 See chapter 7, pp. 216–22, and notes 103 and 109, and chapter 10, pp. 346–9.
25 CPW I, 603. See Nicholas von Maltzahn, Milton’s History of Britain: Republican
Historiography in the English Revolution (Oxford, 1991), 13.
26 Von Maltzhan, Milton’s History of Britain, 12–14. The censor’s name is not recorded,
but his approval must have been gained, after negotiation. There is no record of regis-
tration with the Stationers, perhaps because of Allestry’s death and a change of pub-
lisher. While licensing and registration of all publications was required by law, only
about half the works published between 1662 and 1679 were licensed, due to the
inefficiency and jealousy of the two agents charged with enforcement, L’Estrange as
Surveyer of the Press, and the Stationers Company. See Fredrick S. Siebert, Freedom of
the Press in England, 1476–1776: The Rise and Decline of Government Controls (Urbana,
Ill., 1952), 243.
27 EL 75, 186. See von Maltzahn, Milton’s History of Britain, 15.
28 L’Estrange published a truncated version of Milton’s Digression titled Mr John Miltons
Character of the Long Parliament and Assembly of Divines. In MDCXLI. Omitted in his other
Works, and never before Printed, and very seasonable for these times ( London, 1681). He
made it into a piece of Tory polemic castigating parliaments and dissenters in the midst
of the Exclusion Crisis, which was prompted by Whig efforts preemptively to prevent
the succession of the Roman Catholic James II. L’Estrange’s preface asserts that this
“Character” was part of Milton’s History “and by him designed to be Printed: But out
of tenderness to a Party... it was struck out for some harshness” (sig. A 2v).
29 John Milton, The History of Britain, That part especially now call’d England. From the first
Traditional Beginning, continu’d to the Norman Conquest. Collected out of the antientest and
best Authours thereof (London, 1670). Its publication is noted in a letter of November 1
from Thomas Blount to Anthony à Wood (Bodleian Ms Wood F 40. fol. 80). The first
title page lists James Allestry as bookseller; he died on November 3 and a new title page
was issued by November 22, naming Spencer Hickman as bookseller, with the date
- This version, along with the Paradise Regained/Samson Agonistes volume, is listed
in the Term Catalogues, I, 56, licensed November 22, 1670.
30 Frontispiece from the History of Britain, with the notation “Gul. Fairthorne ad Vivum
Delin. et sculpsit. Joannis Miltoni Effigies Aetat: 62. 1670.” As Milton was not 62 until
December 9, 1670, Allestry evidently expected to publish the History late in the year.
31 Faithorne fought on the king’s side in the civil wars, and was for some time in exile in
Paris. He published a treatise, The Art of Graveing and Etching (London, 1662).
32 A crayon drawing in pastels that resembles the engraving may possibly be Faithorne’s
original; it is now in the library of Princeton University. For a review of the evidence
pertaining to its authenticity, see Leo Miller, “Milton’s Portraits: An Impartial Inquiry
Notes to Chapter 14