PENMANSHIP

See his entry in the Oxford DNB. He published two dozen works on calligraphy, and Pepys described him as ‘the famous writing-master’, and employed him to engrave his slide rule, but it is as an arithmetician that he is remembered: two works published shortly after his death, purportedly from his manuscript, gave rise to the expression ‘according to Cocker’. It has not been established which one of Cocker’s works the present item comes from (his earliest, ‘Pen’s Experience’, is lost). In black ink on one side of a 17 x 11 cm piece of laid paper.

One page, octavo. Very good. Neatly written, as one might expect. 'My usual charge for comparing writings is 2 Gnas and for deciphering MSS. according to the time occupied therein'. He will be 'in Town week after next but as I have to attend at the Courts at Westminster it is uncertain at what hour you would find me here unless you made an appointment beforehand.' Chabot was the author of 'The handwriting of Junius professionally investigated by Charles Chabot, expert | With preface and collateral evidence by the Hon. Edward Twisleton' (1871).