DIGITISED MANUSCRIPTS

( melina Iserne Thure, or of the Iron Door, and that he settled the difficulty by making her his wife; that he was of a speculative turn of mind, and, like 23 ) all speculative geniuses, was often in great monetary distress and harassed by his creditors ; that he became a salaried courtier of the Archbishop of Mayence, with a fixed allowance of corn and wine, and finally died, in 1468, poor, childless, and friendless. Gutenberg’s genius was first employed on a new plan of polishing stones, and afterwards on the manufacture of looking-glasses. About 1440 he entered into partnership with a shrewd goldsmith named John Faust, or Fust, who is accused by some historians of having been Coster’s dishonest J ohn. With the money Gutenberg obtained from Faust he was able to concentrate his time and attention on perfecting the mode of printing, and in course of . time he invented cut metal types. It is related of Faust that, having carried a parcel of books, which he and Gutenberg had printed, to Paris, the French, after considering their great number and exact con- formity, even to points and commas, which the best book-writers could not have rivalled, decided that there was witchcraft in the case and threatened to prosecute Faust as a wizard. This tradition formed the foundation of the legend of Dr. Faustus and the Devil, which has since been so often and so beauti-