Autograph Letter Signed ('W H D Longstaffe') from the Darlington historian and numismatist William Hylton Dyer Longstaffe to 'Dear Appleton' [the New England numismatist William Sumner Appleton], concerning Walter Hilton's 'Scale of Perfection'.

1p., 8vo. 23 lines. On discoloured aged paper. He thanks him for 'Cleveland': 'a decided improvement on the Tweddell press, as it sometimes has been'. He would not 'give any extravagant price' for the 'dull performance' of Walter Hilton [one of Wynkyn de Worde's editions of Hilton's 'Scale of Perfection'], 'but he is interesting, as I believe him to have been a Northern man. Walter de Helton was concerned in Appleby lands in 36 Edw. III. and Walter de Hilton was Rector of Moreby in 1369, and had a brother Wm. (of Burton near Appleby?).' Longstaffe states that a printed translation 'sells as a print, but the colophon will always be amusing'. He suspects that 'the mss. are more commonplace than the prints'. 'Raine has a beautiful one, formerly Greenwell's, or vice versa'. if he was 'a Bishop' he would give '£210 of yellow metal' for Ellis & White's 'curious' copy. 'We numismatists hardly consider, as to light & shade, the yellow metal equal to the white'. He concludes: 'All of which, being gravely considered, proveth XtO to be a very queer fellow.' Longstaffe's papers are in Durham University Library.