part ii. col. 48[301]. The MSS. purchased by the Library are described

in Mr. Coxe's Catalogue, cols. 774-808.

A collection of Arabic tracts and papers, which had formerly belonged to Dr. Kennicott, was given by Shute Barrington, Bishop of Durham.

[301] Some MSS. which had belonged to Saibante, together with some of the Abate Canonici's collection, which had been brought to England by the Abate Celotti, were sold by auction, in London, in 1821. The sale of a further portion, which had passed into the hands of P. de' Gianfilippi (also of Verona), took place at Paris in January, 1843.

A.D. 1821.

The great event of this year was the reception of the famous and extensive collection of English dramatic literature and early poetry, formed by Edmund Malone[302]. It was bequeathed by him on his decease (May 25, 1812) to his brother, Lord Sunderlin, with the expression of a wish that, if not retained as an heirloom in the family, it should be deposited in some public library. In fulfilment of this wish, Lord Sunderlin communicated to the University, in 1815, his intention to transfer the collection to the Bodleian so soon as Mr. James Boswell, to whom it was entrusted in order to assist him in the preparation of a new edition of Malone's _Shakespeare_, should have finished his use of it. That edition being at length issued in 1821, the library was sent to Oxford in the same year. The character of the collection is too well known to need description; suffice it to say that it contains upwards of 800 volumes, of which by far the greater number are distinguished by their rarity. There are first quartos of many of Shakespeare's plays, and second editions of others[303]; of his collected works there are both the first and second folios. Barnfield, Beaumont and Fletcher, Chapman, Decker, Greene, Heywood, Ben Jonson, Lodge, Massinger, Rich. Taylor the water-poet, and Whetstone are amongst those who are most fully represented. There are also a few MSS. A Catalogue of the collection, in folio (52 pp.), with a life of Malone by Boswell (previously printed in _Gent. Magaz._ and Nichol's _Lit. Hist._), was published in 1836; and, in 1861, Mr. J. O. Halliwell printed fifty-one copies of a small _Hand-list_ of the early English literature preserved in it. Various volumes of Malone's own MSS. collections have been subsequently added by purchase; viz. in 1836 some papers relating to the life and writings of Pope; in 1838, his collections for the last edition of his _Shakespeare_ and for the illustration of ancient manners, together with a portion of his literary correspondence; in 1851 a volume of letters written to him by Bishop Percy, between 1783 and 1807; in 1858 three octavo volumes of collections made by him at Oxford; and in 1864 a volume of letters to him from Dr. Johnson, Mrs. Siddons, and others. A large series of pamphlets, chiefly relating to Irish history and to literary matters, comprised in seventy-five volumes, was also purchased in 1838[304]. Almost all his books are uniformly bound in half-calf, with 'E. M.' in an interlaced monogram on the back; a very few have a book-plate consisting of his coat-of-arms within a square of books, with the inscription (in imitation of Grolier's) 'Edm. Malone et amicorum,' and a motto from the _Menagiana_.

A curious instance of the variableness and uncertainty of the prices of books is afforded by the purchase-list of this year, when contrasted with prices paid at the present time. A copy (wanting the preliminary leaves and a few others) of one of the Antwerp editions of Tyndale's New Test. in 1534, (which had belonged to Mr. Benj. Ibott, and is mentioned in Herbert's _Ames_, vol. iii. p. 1543) was bought for nineteen shillings; Mr. Stevens in 1855 priced another imperfect copy at fifteen guineas. But, on the other hand, £63 were given in this year for the rare _Ed. Pr._ of Virgil, printed by Sweynheim and Pannartz in 1469[305]. A somewhat similar instance occurred also in 1826, when Daye's edition of the Apocrypha, printed in 1549 (being vol. iv. of his edition of the Bible in that year), was obtained for fifteen shillings, while £73 10_s._ were paid for an edition of Virgil printed at Venice about 1473.

The very rare German Bible, printed at Strasburgh about 1466, was bought for £42, and a perfect copy of the first edition of the Bishops' Bible, in 1568, for seven guineas[306]. A volume of interest in typographical history was presented, in the first book printed in New South Wales. It is entitled _Michael Howe, the last and worst of the Bush Rangers of Van Dieman's Land; narrative of the chief atrocities committed by this great murderer and his associates during a period of six years in Van Dieman's Land_: it extends to thirty-six small octavo pages, and was printed at Hobart Town, by Andrew Bent, in Dec, 1818[307].

The Catalogue of the Oriental MSS., commenced in the year 1787 by Uri, was continued in this year by the publication by Mr. Nicoll of the first part of a second volume, containing notices of 234 additional Arabic MSS. His premature death occurred before the publication of the second part, which he had printed as far as p. 388; this was completed and edited (with nine lithographic plates of specimens of Arabic MSS.) by his successor in the Hebrew Professorship, Dr. Pusey, in 1835. It contains altogether descriptions of 296 Arabic volumes, together with copious additions by Dr. Pusey to Uri's first portion, which are noticed above, p. 199.

The Parish Registers of Newington, Kent, and of Bures, in Suffolk, which had come into the Library among Dr. Rawlinson's books, were restored to their respective parishes by a decree submitted to Convocation on Nov. 9. In the Register of Convocation itself, by a singular omission, no mention of the former of these parish books is made (although included in the proposal), and the restoration of that of Bures is alone recorded. But by enquiry addressed to the Vicar of Newington, it has been ascertained that one of the Registers contains a memorandum of its having been returned by vote of Convocation on the day in question.

By a vote of Convocation on July 7, the rooms on the first floor of the Schools' quadrangle, which were formerly used as the Hebrew and Greek Schools, were assigned to the Library; the former (on the south side) now contains, in two rooms, the Bodley, Laud, and other collections of MSS.; the latter (on the north side), also in two rooms, the foreign and English periodicals[308].

On May 25, a plan for warming the Library was, for the first time, adopted. It consisted in introducing hot air simply at two small gratings at one end of the Library, from pipes communicating with a stove placed (with the consent of Exeter College) where the furnace of the present apparatus is situated, in the wall between the north-west corner of the Library and the Ashmolean Museum. As a means of warming the Library generally the system was wholly ineffectual, no benefit being experienced except by those who remained in the immediate vicinity of the gratings. It remained, however, in use until 1845, when pipes were laid down through a considerable part of the Library for the purpose of warming it by steam. This plan, however, did not give satisfaction, either on the ground of safety or of effectiveness. In 1855 Mr. Braidwood, the late distinguished head of the London Fire Brigade, was brought down to survey the apparatus and to examine generally how the Library could best be secured against fire; and, by his advice and that of Mr. G. G. Scott, the pipes were enclosed in slate casings, so as effectually to hinder contact with any inflammable materials, and two fire-proof iron doors were inserted at the entrances to the great Reading-room, in order to cut it off from the rest of the building[309]. But in 1861 steam was discarded for the safer and more effectual system, now in use, of warming by hot water; new pipes (cased in slate) were laid down by Messrs. Haden and Son, and were carried through the Examination Schools on the ground-floor of the quadrangle, as well as through the Library.

In Feb. Mr. J. P. Roberts, New College (B.A. 1821, M.A. 1826, now Minor Canon of Chichester) was appointed _minister_, _vice_ Mr. P. Barrett, Wadham College (B.A. 1828); and Mr. Robert Eden, of St. John's College (Corp. Chr. Coll. B.A. 1825, M.A. 1827, now Vicar of Wymondham, Norfolk), was appointed _vice_ Walker. From this time there appear to have been two assistants, although it was not until 1837 that that number was formally allowed by Statute.

[302] Malone was the son of an Irish Judge. He was born in Dublin, Oct. 4, 1741, was educated at Trin. Coll. Dublin, where he took the degree of M.A., and became a barrister, but soon retired from legal practice.

[303] For notices of the purchase of several early quartos, wanting in this series, see 1834.

[304] These are now incorporated with the large collection called _Godwyn Pamphlets_. A copy of Wood's _Ath. Oxon._ with MSS. notes by Malone, was given by Mr. B. H. Bright in 1835.

[305] Various other _editt. princ._ were bought in this year, with some Aldines. Also a collection of modern Greek works printed at Venice.

[306] Offor's copy sold for £41; Lea Wilson's for £61 10_s._

[307] The present writer has in his possession an early newspaper printed in New Zealand, the _Auckland Times_, No. 41, for Apr. 6, 1843, not merely curious in relation to the history of the colony, but also as a typographical relic. Its crowning interest is to be found in its colophon (if such a classical word may be applied to the imprint of a newspaper), which states that it was '_Printed in a mangle_.'

[308] In Lascelles' Account of Oxford, published in this year, it is said that the printed books in the Library were computed at 160,000, and the MSS. at 30,000.

[309] Mr. Braidwood's report was printed in 1856, together with one from Mr. Scott, on the extension of the Library, and the means of rendering it fire-proof.

A.D. 1822.

In July, the Rev. Dr. Bliss returned to the Library as Sub-librarian, in the room of Mr. Nicoll, appointed Regius Professor of Hebrew. And in October the Rev. Rich. French Laurence, M.A., of Pembroke College, succeeded Dr. Cotton, who quitted Oxford for Ireland.

'Tuesday, August 6, 1822, I was at the Library the whole day, and not a single member of the University came into the room, excepting Mr. Eden, the assistant. Oxford race-day.' This note occurs in vol. x. of Dr. Bliss's MS. antiquarian and miscellaneous memoranda. Considering that the time of the year was well-nigh the middle of the Long Vacation, it does not seem surprising that on one day there should have been no academic readers in the Library, even if there may have been academic riders on the race-course. The two occurrences have so little correspondence with each other that one would hope that the zealous Sub-librarian (who has deemed the same want of readers worth commemorating also in another note) assigned _non causa pro causa_.

A.D. 1823.

By the exertions of the brothers J. S. and P. B. Duncan, Esqs., Fellows of New College, distinguished for their efforts to promote the study of the Arts and Sciences in the University, a subscription-fund was raised for the purpose of adorning the Picture Gallery with plaster models of some of the finest buildings of Greek and Roman antiquity. The result was that in the present year the following series, by Fouquet, of Paris, was placed in the Gallery, at a total cost of about £400:--The Arch of Constantine, the Parthenon, the Temple of the Sybil at Tivoli, the Maison Carrée at Nismes, the Erechtheum and Lantern of Demosthenes at Athens, the Theatre of Herculaneum, and the Temple of Fortuna Virilis at Rome.

A large number of works by foreign authors, chiefly theological, was bought (for £375) at the sale at Leyden of the library of Jonas Wilh. Te Water, professor of Eccl. Hist. in that University. A separate catalogue, occupying twenty-three folio pages, was issued of these books.

Mr. E. P. New, of St. John's College (B.A. 1822, M.A. 1825, B.D. 1831), was appointed in December to assist in the compilation of the new Catalogue; but how long he remained in the Library does not appear.

A.D. 1824.

A collection of valuable original papers relating to affairs in Church and State, which had belonged to Archbishop Sheldon, were sold by his great-nephew, Sir John English Dolben, of Finedon, Northamptonshire, to the Library for £40 5_s._ They are now bound in six volumes, of which three are lettered _Sheldon_, and three _Dolben_. Of the first three, two contain letters from English, Welsh, Scotch and Irish Bishops, and the contents of the other are miscellaneous; of the second three, one contains miscellaneous letters and papers commencing at 1585, another has similar papers from 1626 to 1721, and the third contains miscellaneous ecclesiastical letters and documents. Some of the letters are addressed to the Archbishop's secretary, Miles Smyth, Esq. A short letter from Sir John Dolben to Dr. Bandinel, relating to his disposal of these papers, dated Oct. 12, 1824, is preserved in Bodl. MS. Addit. ii. A. 32. He had previously given, in 1822, a fine copy of a quarto Bible which had belonged to Sheldon, containing (1) the Prayer-Book and Metrical Psalms, printed at Cambridge in 1638, (2) the Old Test., printed by Field at London in 1648, and (3) the New Test., Cambr. 1637. At the end are some memoranda by the Archbishop of the births, baptisms, and deaths of members of the Sheldon and Okeover families, and of the legitimate children of Charles II and the Duke of York. The Library more than a century before had received benefactions from a member of the same family of Dolben; Gilbert Dolben, of Finedon, having given some printed books in 1697, together with a manuscript of Gower. And twenty vols. of Chamberlaine's _State of Great Britain_ were given by Mr. J. E. Dolben in 1796. An additional volume of the Sheldon correspondence was given to the Library in 1840, by Dr. Routh, the President of Magdalen College. It is a copy-book of business-letters written by the Archbishop. In a note to Dr. Bandinel which accompanied the gift, and which is now fixed in vol. i. of Burnet's autograph copy of his _Own Times_, Dr. Routh says:--

'The President takes the opportunity of sending a volume containing the first draught of letters sent by Archbp. Sheldon to different persons, together with a few other contemporary papers. They were put into the President's hands by the late Sir John English Dolben, and as the University purchased of that gentleman what were commonly called the Sheldon Papers, he thinks they cannot be deposited anywhere more suitably than in the Bodleian Library.'

To the annual catalogue for this year was attached a special list, filling thirty-two folio pages, of the books (upwards of 1500 in number) which were bought at the Hague, at the sale of the library collected by the distinguished Dutch scholars and lawyers, Gerard and John Meerman. The sale-catalogue is a volume of more than 1200 pages. The books bought for the Library were chiefly such as supplied deficiencies in foreign history and law, together with some Greek[310] and Latin MSS., for the most part patristic and classical. The sum expended was £925. Some rare Spanish historical books (in which class of literature, thanks to Dr. Bandinel's care in keeping it steadily in view, the Library is now very rich) were bought at the sale of Don J. Ant. Conde.

But the chief distinction of this year lies in the acquisition, by bequest of Mrs. Elizabeth Dennis Denyer (widow of Mr. John Denyer, of Chelsea, who died in 1806) of a most valuable collection of early editions of the English Bible, numbering altogether about twenty-five. To show the rarity and worth of this collection, it will be sufficient to mention but a few of the volumes which it contains. _Imprimis_, Coverdale's first edition, 1535[311], and his second edition, 1537; Cranmer's, in April, 1540 and in 1541, and by Grafton in 1553; Matthew's, by Becke, in 1551; Tyndale's New Testament, in 1536, and another of his earliest editions; Hollybush's English and Latin Testament, 1538, and Erasmus' Testament, 1540. Besides the Biblical collection, Mrs. Denyer also bequeathed twenty-one English theological works, nearly all printed before 1600; including a beautiful copy of Fisher on the Penitential Psalms (by Wynkyn de Worde) and books by (amongst others) Bale, Bonner, Brightwell, Erasmus, Hooper, Joye, and Tonstall.

Mr. L. E. Judge, New College (B.A. 1827, M.A. 1830; Chaplain; deceased 1853), succeeded Mr. Roberts, in March, as assistant; but in July of the next year retired, and was succeeded by Mr. W. Bailey, also of New College (B.A. 1829).

[310] These, in number thirty-eight, are described in Mr. Coxe's Catalogue, cols. 724-773. An eighth-century copy of Eusebius' _Chronicon_ is among the Latin MSS.

[311] Wanting title and map. A title had been supplied by Mrs. Denyer, who in several instances had supplied deficiencies very successfully in pen and ink; a perfect facsimile, however, by Mr. J. Harris, which might pass for the original, were not the minute mark '_Fs. T. H._' seen on the back of the page, has since been substituted. It is a marvel of caligraphic skill. Another imperfect copy came to the Library among Selden's books.

A.D. 1825.

The sale at Paris of the library of L. M. Langlès, the keeper of the Oriental MSS. in the Bibl. Royale, afforded a large accession of books in that branch of literature which was his specialty.

Mr. Sim. J. Etty, New College (B.A. 1829, M.A. 1832, now Vicar of Wanborough, Wilts), was appointed assistant in the room of Mr. Eden. Mr. Etty remained in the Library until the year 1834. The Catalogue of _Dissertationes Academicæ_, which appeared in 1832, was in a great measure his work.

Two MSS. intended of old for the Library by Sir K. Digby, were bought in this year. To the account of them given at p. 58 _supra_, it should be added that the library left in France by Digby on his death (from which, no doubt, these volumes came) was bought back by George, Earl of Bristol, and finally sold by auction at London, in April and May, 1680. Sixty-nine MSS. were included in this dispersion. It should further be added to the previous notice that it was at Laud's instance, and through him as Chancellor of the University, that Digby presented his collection to the Library. A letter from the Archbishop, which accompanied the gift, is printed in Wharton's collection of his _Remains_, vol. ii. p. 73.

A.D. 1826.

There is not much to notice in the acquisitions of this year. A few Persian and other Oriental MSS. were purchased, and more in the two following years; and some Burmese MSS. were given by Sir C. Grey, Chief Justice of Calcutta. A curious volume of manuscript and printed papers relative to the siege of Oxford, 1643-46, was presented by Mr. W. Hamper, of Birmingham. In January, the Rev. Chas. Hen. Cox, M.A., Student of Ch. Ch., was appointed Sub-librarian in the room of Mr. Laurence.

A.D. 1827.

A very large collection of Academic Dissertations published in Germany, amounting to about 43,400, was bought at Altona for £332 16_s._ Of these a folio catalogue was published in 1834, which, by a singular error, bears on its title the date 1832, as the year in which this accession came to the Library. In 1828, 160 volumes of the same character were added, and other large additions were made in 1836 and 1837, but particularly in 1846, when no fewer than 7000 were purchased[312].

Mr. Henry Forster, New College (B.A. 1832, M.A. 1834; Esquire Bedel of Divinity; deceased 1857), succeeded Mr. Bailey, in March, as Assistant.

[312] There is scarcely an imaginable subject in law, theology, or history, on which something may not be found in this vast collection. The _something_ may often be meagre and superficial, but it is still oftener curious, and even in the former case it may be useful as pointing to sources of further information. In days of Ritual controversy, one party or another may be glad to know that in 1725, George Henry Goetz, D.D., wrote on the interesting question whether a clergyman might do duty in his dressing-gown,--_Num Verbi ministro toga cubicularia_ (Schlaffpeltze) _induto officio sacro defungi liceat?_ Those who know what curses were invoked of old upon the heads of stealers of books, may be interested in hearing what one Pipping had to say on the subject in 1721, in his _Diss. de Imprecationibus libris ascriptis_; while the title of Sam. Schelging's discourse in 1729, _De Apparitionibus mortuorum vivis ex pacto factis_, will have attraction for not a few. Sometimes the dryest subjects were lightened up at the close with ponderous jokes, or unexpected turns were given to the matter in hand; _e.g._ those worthy Germans who had gone to sleep at Jena, in 1660, during the reading of a dissertation _De Jure et Potestate Parlamenti Britannici_, by one J. A. Gerhard, (who must have taken unusual interest in the history of the English Rebellion,) were wakened up at the end by the discussion of the following novel questions in law:--'Casus ex jure privato.

'I. Titius ducit uxorem Caiam. Caia, elapso uno vel altero anno, transmutatur in virum. Q. an Caia hæc, soluto per hanc metamorphosin matrimonio, possit repetere dotem? Dist.

'II. Sempronia, defuncto marito Mævio, nubit Titio. Mævius divinâ potentiâ in vitam resuscitatur mortalem. Q. an Mævius hic, secundum vivus, uxorem Semproniam et bona sua repetere possit? Aff.'

It was usual for the friends of the candidate who defended the thesis of the Dissertation (generally written for him by the _Præses_) to attach some complimentary letters or verses. In the case of those published at Upsal, the zeal of the encomiasts frequently breaks out into wild compositions in Hebrew, Greek, French, German and English, affording in the latter instance (and it may be in others) very curious specimens of the language. A laborious trifler, named P. Wettersten, compliments a friend, who had read at Upsal, in 1742, a dissertation by Prof. Peter Ekerman on the antiquities of a small town called Norkoping, with a kind of acrostic in twenty-five lines on the verse, 'Nunc erit et seclis Norcopia clara futuris,' which, starting from the centre of the page, may be read upwards, downwards, and in every form of mazy irregularity; every way, in short, except the right.

A.D. 1828.

A collection of 153 Northern MSS., chiefly in the Icelandic and Danish languages, formed by Finn Magnusen, was purchased from him for £350[313]. A catalogue (56 pp. quarto) was published in the year 1832. Amongst them are many early and curious volumes in poetry and history. Other collections of MSS. were sold by the same collector to the British Museum and to the Advocates' Library at Edinburgh.

A large number of Aldines were obtained at the sale of the collection of M. Renouard, the Aldine bibliographer, which took place in London, June 26-30. And the rare first edition of John Knox's _Historie of the Church of Scotland_ was purchased for sixteen guineas.

Some additional rooms on the second story of the Schools' quadrangle, on the north and east sides, which went by the names of the Schools of Geometry and Medicine, were permanently attached to the Library, by vote of Convocation, on June 5.

On June 26, the nomination of the Rev. Stephen Reay, M.A., of St. Alban's Hall (afterwards B.D., and Laudian Professor of Arabic in 1840), as Sub-librarian in the room of Mr. C. H. Cox, was approved in Convocation. Mr. Reay was appointed to the charge of the Oriental department, his knowledge of Hebrew specially qualifying him for the care of the yearly increasing mass of Rabbinical lore. To this branch he added, and retained to the close of his life, the care of the 'Progress' Room, or room containing the publications, foreign and English, which appeared in parts. And on Dec. 20, the Rev. John Besly, M.A., Fellow of Balliol (afterwards D.C.L., and Vicar of Long Benton, Northumberland, deceased April 17, 1868, aged sixty-eight), was confirmed as Mr. Reay's colleague, in the place of Dr. Bliss.

[313] Some notes by G. J. Thorkelin on Northern Antiquities were bought in 1846.

A.D. 1829.

The great Hebrew collection, which at present forms so distinguished a feature in the contents of the Library, was virtually commenced in this year by the purchase, at Hamburgh (for £2080), of the famous Oppenheimer library, consisting of upwards of 5000 volumes, of which 780 are MSS[314]. Many Hebrew works had, it is true, come with Selden's library, in 1659; but little or nothing had been done since that period to advance upon that beginning. The additions made in this department from 1844 up to about the year 1857, are said, in Dr. Steinschneider's introduction to his catalogue (_col._ 50), to have numbered no fewer than about 2100 volumes[315].

David Oppenheimer, Chief Rabbi at Prague, devoted more than half a century to the formation of his library. On his death, Sept. 23, 1735, it came into the possession of his son, a Rabbi at Hildesheim, and thence into the hands of Isaac Seligmann at Hamburgh. Several catalogues were issued during this period, the last being one in octavo, at Hamburgh, in 1826, an index to which, compiled by Dr. J. Goldenthal, was printed at the expense of the Library in 1845. The collection would have been dispersed by auction, had it not been bought _en masse_ for Oxford. It possesses extreme interest and value in the eyes of Jewish students, insomuch that for a series of years the Library was never without several foreign visitors engaged in its examination. A very elaborate catalogue of all the printed Hebrew books contained in it, and throughout the whole of the Library, was compiled by Dr. M. Steinschneider during the years 1850-1860, and printed at Berlin, where it was published in the latter year in a very thick quarto volume. The book is divided into two parts: the first containing a description of the Biblical, Talmudical, liturgical and anonymous volumes; the second containing the works of miscellaneous authors, in the alphabetical order of their names. Prefixed is a brief list of the Hebrew MSS. in the Library, with the numbers at present attached to them, and references to the catalogues in which they are described. Of several rare books in the Oppenheimer library there are duplicate copies, varying in condition and ornamentation; of some there are copies on red, yellow, and blue paper. Distinguished amongst all is a copy of the Talmud, printed in 1713-28, in twenty-four folio volumes, entirely on vellum. 'Perhaps,' says Archdeacon Cotton, 'this work is the grandest and most extensive vellum publication extant[316].'

Mr. Robert Bowyer, miniature painter to Queen Charlotte, who had devoted a considerable part of his life to the collection of drawings and engravings illustrating the Holy Scriptures, put forward a proposal for their purchase by subscription with a view to their being deposited in the Bodleian. Their number amounted to nearly seven thousand (including 113 drawings by Loutherbourg), described as being in fine condition and of great value; and they were inserted as additional illustrations in a copy of Macklin's folio Bible, which was enlarged thereby from its original extent of seven volumes to forty-five. Hence the collection passed, and passes, under the name of Bowyer's Bible. Mr. Bowyer, who had spent upon it upwards of three thousand pounds, proposed to dispose of it for £2500, and a committee was formed in London, upon which appeared the names of many distinguished persons, to raise a subscription for the purpose. But upon Mr. Bowyer's despatching an agent to Oxford, the matter met with so little encouragement here, the Librarian, in particular, being (as Dr. Bliss has noted upon his copy of the original proposal) unfavourable to it, that the project fell to the ground. The reasons why Oxford made so little response do not appear; probably the value set upon the collection was deemed to be greatly exaggerated. After the death of Mr. Bowyer (June 4, 1834, aged seventy-six) the Bible came into the hands of one Mrs. Parkes, of Golden Square, by whom it was disposed of, in 1848, in a lottery (together with a few other prizes) for which four thousand tickets were issued at one guinea each. The successful speculator was Mr. Saxon, a gentleman-farmer, near Shepton Mallet. In 1852 it was in the hands of Messrs. Puttick and Simpson, the well-known book-auctioneers, for sale. By them it was announced for an auction on Feb. 26, 1853, and was disposed of, about that time, to Messrs. Willis and Sotheran, the booksellers, for about £500. Since then it has been announced for sale at Manchester.

[314] One MS. which had strayed from Oppenheimer's library previously to its transfer to the Bodleian, was purchased and restored to its place in 1847.

[315] A notice of the Oppenheimer collection, and of the other Hebrew portions of the Library is given in the preface to vol. iii. of Fürst's _Bibliotheca Judaica_, 8^o. Leipz. 1863, pp. 42-51. The _Catalogus Interpretum S. Script._, by Thomas James, in 1635, is here metamorphosed into one by Thomas _Jones_, in 1735.

[316] _Typographical Gazetteer_, p. 349.

A.D. 1830.

A copy of the rare edition of Luther's translation of the Bible, printed at Wittemberg in 1541, was bought, through Messrs. Payne and Foss, for fifty guineas, at the sale, in London, of the library of the Archdeacon de la Tour, of Hildesheim, which was said to have been formerly the property of the English Benedictine Monastery of Landspring, and which was then, it appears, in the possession of Mr. -- Solly. It contains some texts on the fly-leaves in the autograph, and with the signatures, of both Luther and Melanchthon, which seem to have been unnoticed at the time of the sale. A facsimile of a part of Luther's inscription is given in plate xxxi. in Mr. Leigh Sotheby's _Illustrations of the Handwriting of Melanchthon_[317]. The book is now exhibited in a glass case, in one of the windows of the Library.

[317] A copy of this edition, with MS. notes by Luther, Melanchthon, Bugenhagen and Major, was sold to the British Museum, at Hibbert's sale in 1829, for £267 15_s._!

A.D. 1831.

In December of this year, Viscount Kingsborough[318] presented a magnificent copy (being one of four which were printed on vellum) of his _Antiquities of Mexico_, or coloured facsimiles, executed at his expense, in seven folio volumes, of Mexican paintings and hieroglyphics preserved in the libraries of Paris, Berlin, Dresden, Vienna, Rome, Bologna, and Oxford (in Laud's and Selden's collections), together with preliminary dissertations. This sumptuous book is exhibited near the entrance of the library, in a case made expressly for its reception.

On June 30, the nomination, as Sub-librarian, of Rev. Ernest Hawkins, M.A., of Balliol, afterwards Fellow of Exeter, (of late well-known for his labours in the cause of Missions, as Secretary to the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel), was approved by Convocation. He succeeded Dr. Besly, who had taken the Balliol College living of Long Benton, in Northumberland.

[318] This learned and spirited nobleman died, in 1837, in a debtors' prison in Dublin, where he was confined for liabilities incurred on behalf of his father, the Earl of Kingston.

A.D. 1832.

A twelfth-century MS. of Scholia on the _Odyssey_ was purchased for £100. The collection of Bibles, which had during some time past made some slow progress, was increased by copies of various early printed versions in European languages, and its further enlargement was steadily kept in view in succeeding years.

Six guineas were given for copies of Servetus' treatise _De Trinitatis erroribus_ and his _Dialogi de Trinitate_, printed in 1531 and 1532, which are of very great rarity, in consequence of their having very generally shared the fate of their author.

A.D. 1833.

Some precious Shakespearian volumes, consisting of the _Venus and Adonis_ of 1594 and 1617, the _Lucrece_ of 1594 and 1616, with a subsequent edition of 1655, and the _Sonnets_ of 1609, were presented by the well-known collector, Mr. Thomas Caldecott, who had been formerly a Fellow of New College. They are now incorporated with the Malone collection. Several MSS. of Sir William Jones were presented by the brothers Augustus and Julius C. Hare. An interesting and large collection of tracts on the Roman Catholic disabilities, affairs in Ireland, &c., in forty-five volumes, was purchased at the sale of the library of Charles Butler, of Lincoln's Inn.

An anonymous pamphlet, entitled, _A Few Words on the Bodleian Library_, appeared in this year; its author was Sir Edmund Head, M.A., Merton College. The object was to urge the desirableness of allowing books to be borrowed from the Library, after the example of Cambridge. One of the arguments by which the author supported the proposal, viz. that College tutors were unable to visit the Library in term time during the hours at which it is open, has since been entirely removed by the attachment of the Radcliffe Library as a Reading-room, which remains open until ten o'clock at night. The pamphlet was reprinted in the Report of the University Commission in 1852.

A.D. 1834.

Numerous purchases were made during the sale of Mr. Heber's library. Amongst these were some rare English tracts of the Reformers, Bale, Becon, Tyndal, Knox, &c; a large and valuable collection of booksellers' catalogues and sale catalogues of books and coins between 1726 and 1814[319]; and a mass of some 1100 or 1200 plays, published in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries[320]. Numerous early Shakespeare editions were also obtained; _inter alias_, the first edition (1594) of the first part of the _Contention betwixt the Houses of Yorke and Lancaster_, for £64; _Richard III_, 1598, £17; fourth edit. of _Henry IV_, 1608, £12 12_s._[321], &c. The greater part of the collection of editions of Horace up to the year 1738, formed by Dr. Douglas, a collection which was used in the preparation of the edition published at London, by James Watson, in 1760, was bought for £20. It consists of twenty-seven vols. in folio, thirty-nine in quarto, and 248 in octavo and smaller sizes. Dibdin (_Introd. to the Classics_) says that the whole collection consisted of 450 editions. A Prayer-Book of 1707, with MSS. collations by Rev. John Lewis, of Margate, of alterations in editions between 1549 and 1637, was bought for £8 8_s._ One of the chief gems in the Picture Gallery was bequeathed by James Paine, Esq., being the portrait of his father, James Paine, the architect[322], while instructing his son in drawing, by Sir Joshua Reynolds. This beautiful picture has retained its freshness of colour far more perfectly than most others of Sir Joshua's paintings; and it has recently, under the direction of the present Librarian, been carefully cleaned, and protected with glass and a curtain, that its brilliancy may incur no risk of deterioration. But this year is chiefly distinguished in the Annals of the Library by the bequest of the

DOUCE COLLECTION.

Francis Douce, the donor of this magnificent library (who died on March 30, in this year), is said to have been induced to make this disposition of his treasures through the courteous reception afforded to him by Dr. Bandinel, upon the occasion of a visit to Oxford, in 1830. The gatherings of a lifetime with which the Bodleian was thus enriched, consist of 393 manuscripts, ninety-eight charters, about 16,480 printed volumes, a very large collection of early and valuable prints and drawings, and some coins[323]. For the most part, the books which thus came were of classes in which the Library was then deficient. Nearly all the finest specimens of Missal-painting which it now possesses are found among the Douce MSS., several of which are exhibited in a glass case at the further end of the Library. Chief among these are three volumes of _Horæ_, one executed, perhaps by G. da Libri, at the beginning of the sixteenth century for Leonora Gonzaga, Duchess of Urbino, a second belonged to Mary de Medici, and the other was completed in 1527 for B. Sforza, second wife of Sigism. I of Poland. These are priceless gems, rivalled only by such as the Bedford Missal. In the same case is a Psalter on purple vellum, probably of the ninth century, which came from the old Royal Library of France, and which, from this circumstance and its age, has sometimes been called Charlemagne's Psalter. The printed books are rich in history, biography, antiquities, manners and customs, and the fine arts[324]. In Bibles (English and French), Horæ, Primers, Books of Common Prayer and Psalters, the collection is very strong. Among the Psalters is a copy of Archbishop Parker's rare metrical version. Early French literature is also a conspicuous feature, in which the Library had previously been very deficient. Of fifteenth-century typography there are no fewer than 311 specimens. The finest of these is a magnificent copy of Christoforo Landino's Italian translation of Pliny's Natural History, printed on vellum by Nic. Janson, at Venice, in 1476. It is enriched with exquisite illuminated borders at the commencement of each book, a specimen of which, together with a description of the volume, is given in Shaw's _Illuminated Ornaments_, pl. xxxviii[325]. There are also a large number of fragments of works by early English printers, including two by Caxton, which are unique. One of these is a portion (two quarters of an octavo or duodecimo sheet) of an edition of the _Horæ_, conjecturally assigned by Mr. Blades to 1478, and the other is of an edition of the _Booke of Curtesye_, probably printed in 1491, consisting of two quarto pages. There is also one of the two known copies of a curious placard, issued by Caxton, inviting those who were disposed to buy 'ony pyes of two and thre comemoracions of Salisburi vse' to come to him at Westminster, and they should have them 'good chepe[326].' The other copy is in the possession of Earl Spencer. A very different, but still very curious, item is a large collection of chap-books and children's penny books of the last century and commencement of the present; and two folio volumes are filled with black-letter ballads. A catalogue of the library was published in one volume, in folio, in 1840; the part containing the printed books was the work of Mr. H. Symonds, of Magdalen Hall (B.A. 1840, M.A. 1842, now Precentor of Norwich), and that which describes the Fragments, the Charters and the Manuscripts was drawn up by Rev. H. O. Coxe. From the year 1839 until the commencement of 1842, Mr. Thomas Dodd, formerly a well-known London dealer in prints, and author of the _Connoisseur's Repertory_, was employed in making a catalogue of the Douce prints and drawings. This catalogue still remains in MS. Four very grand studies of heads, drawn either by Raffaelle or Giulio Romano, have recently been framed and hung at the western end of the Library.

On June 25, Convocation sanctioned the transfer to the Library of the room immediately over the entrance in the gateway-tower of the Schools, (now called the _Mason Room_) which had been hitherto assigned as the 'Savile Study,' on condition that a small room in the adjoining south-east angle of the quadrangle should be prepared at the expense of the Bodleian for the reception of the MSS. and printed books, instruments, &c., which were given to the University by Sir Henry Savile for the use of his Professors. This is the room in which the Savile library (which includes also some books given by Dr. Wallis and Sir Christopher Wren) is still preserved, under the charge of the Savilian Professors of Geometry and Astronomy.

On July 5, Convocation confirmed the nomination of Rev. William Cureton, M.A., of Ch. Ch. (afterwards so well known for his Syriac studies, which gained him the patronage of the Prince Consort and a Canonry at Westminster), to the Sub-librarianship vacated by Rev. E. Hawkins.

Mr. Edmund Grove, of Magdalen College (who never graduated), was appointed Assistant in April, _vice_ Mr. Stephen Exup. Wentworth, of Balliol (B.A. 1833, M.A. 1835). Mr. Wentworth appears to have succeeded Mr. Forster in 1832.

[319] Another collection of sale catalogues in forty-five vols. was purchased in 1836.

[320] Another collection, in twenty-eight vols., of plays chiefly dating from 1630 to 1707, was bought, in 1842, for £6 17_s._

[321] In 1837 _Romeo and Juliet_, printed by Smethwicke, n. d., was bought for £9 10_s._; in 1840, _Richard III_, 1605, for £21, and _Hamlet_, 1611, for £10 10_s._; and in 1841 the first edit. 1595, of