'These notes,' says Malone, 'are faithfully preserved.'
He adds that 'every new remark, not written by the author, for the sake
of distinction has been enclosed within crotchets[38].' In the third
edition therefore we have the work in the condition in which it would
have most approved itself to Boswell's own judgment. In one point only,
and that a trifling one, had Malone to exercise his judgment. But so
skilful an editor was very unlikely to go wrong in those few cases in
which he was called upon to insert in their proper places the additional
material which the author had already published in his second edition.
Malone did not, however, correct the proof-sheets. I thought it my duty,
therefore, in revising my work to have the text of Boswell's second
edition read aloud to me throughout. Some typographical errors might, I
feared, have crept in. In a few unimportant cases early in the book I
adopted the reading of the second edition, but as I read on I became
convinced that almost all the verbal alterations were Boswell's own.
Slight errors, often of the nature of Scotticisms, had been corrected,
and greater accuracy often given. Some of the corrections and additions
in the third edition that were undoubtedly from his hand were of
considerable importance.
I have retained Boswell's spelling in accordance with the wish that he
expressed in the preface to his _Account of Corsica_.
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