It is ten to one (at _Arthur's_) whether you have ever read the literary histories of past ages; --if you have, what terrible battles, 'yclept logomachies, have they occasioned and perpetuated with so much gall and ink-shed, --that a good-natured man cannot read the accounts of them without tears in his eyes.

If you have ever read the literary histories of past ages; - what terrible battles of words they have perpetuated, with so much gall and ink shed that a good-natured man cannot read them without tears in his eyes