His action was apparently taken by the
readers of the _Gentleman's Magazine_ at his own valuation.
Meanwhile the discerning critic was not altogether passive. Isaac
D'Israeli denounced the fraud in his _Curiosities of Literature_; but
he and others did their protesting gently. The fraud looked to the
expert too shamefaced to merit a vigorous onslaught. He imagined the
spurious epistle must die of its own inanity. In this he miscalculated
the credulity of the general reader. "Grenovicus" of the _Gentleman's
Magazine_ had numerous disciples.
Many a time during the past century has that worthy's exploit been
repeated. Even so acute a scholar as Alexander Dyce thought it worth
while to reprint the letter in 1829 in the first edition of his
collected works of George Peele (Vol. I., page 111), although he
declined to pledge himself to its authenticity. The latest historian
of Dulwich College[40] has admitted it to his text with too mildly
worded a caveat. Often, too, has "G. Peel" emerged more recently from
a long-forgotten book or periodical to darken the page of a modern
popular magazine. I have met him unabashed during the present century
in two literary periodicals of repute--in the _Academy_ (of London),
in the issue of 18th January 1902, and in the _Poet Lore_ (of Boston)
in the following April number.
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