Annals of the Bodleian Library, Oxford, A.D. 1598-A.D. 1867 Part 32

The next collection is that of Anthony a Wood, containing about 130 MSS.

and 970 printed volumes[355], which were bequeathed to the Museum by the owner on his death in Nov. 1695. The former are of extreme value for the history of Oxford and the neighbourhood; among the latter are most curious sets of the pamphlets of the time, with the ballads, fly-sheets, chap-books, almanacks, &c. just such 'unconsidered trifles' as most men suffer to perish in the using, but a few, like Wood, lay by for the amus.e.m.e.nt and information of future generations. There are also seven volumes of his own correspondence, including letters from Dugdale, Evelyn, &c. Of the MSS. a list is to be found in the old Catalogue of 1697; a fuller and better one, compiled by William Huddesford, M.A., the Keeper of the Museum, was printed in a thin octavo volume, in 1761, which was reprinted by Sir Thomas Phillips, at Middlehill, Worcestershire, in 1824. There are also bundles of charters and deeds, chiefly monastic, but nearly all more or less mutilated or injured by damp and dirt, so as to be partially useless.

The third collection is that of Dr. Martin Lister, physician to Queen Anne, who died Feb. 2, 1711/2. Besides his books, he was the donor of various other gifts to the Museum, in return for which he was created M.D. of Oxford, in 1683. The books are chiefly medical and scientific, and number in a written catalogue 1451 volumes (including thirty-two MSS.), but thirty-five of these were missing when the transfer from the Museum was made.

The collections of Sir William Dugdale, which form a fourth series, number forty-eight volumes. A list of these is in the old Catalogue of 1697.

In the fifth place there are the MSS. of the well-known antiquary, John Aubrey. These are about twenty in number, of which fifteen are in his own hand, and are described in Britton's Life of him, printed for the Wilts Topographical Society, pp. 88-123. Collections for the history of Wiltshire, ent.i.tled _Hypomnemata Antiquaria_, form one of Aubrey's own works[356], but unfortunately the second volume (marked with the letter B) is missing. It was borrowed from the Museum, in 1703, by William Aubrey, the author's brother, and was never returned. A paper on the subject was inserted by Rev. J. E. Jackson, in 1860, in vol. vii. of the Wiltshire Archaeological Magazine, and a reward for information as to the present _locale_ of the missing volume was subsequently publicly offered, but to no purpose, by the same gentleman. A small MS. of _Horae_, which had belonged to Sir Thomas Pope, the founder of Trinity College, is among Aubrey's books. A MS. of Matthew of Westminster, (now _e Mus._ 149) had been given to the Library by Aubrey, in 1675, through Ant. a Wood.

There are also five or six MSS. which were given to the Museum by William Kingsley before 1700. Some few others, which were given by E.

Lhuyd and Dr. W. Borlase, together with a volume of W. Huddesford's correspondence, are now incorporated with the Ashmole MSS., and are described in Mr. Black's catalogue, as well as the latest gift of this kind which was made to the Museum, _viz._ a little volume of _Private Thoughts_, by Bishop Wilson, of Sodor and Man, which was presented in 1824 by Lieut. Brett, R.N.

Thirty-nine choice Persian and Arabic MSS., which had formed part of Sir Gore Ouseley's collection, were bought from his son, Sir Fred. Gore Ouseley, Bart., the present Professor of Music, for 500. The rest of the collection came by gift, as will be seen under the following year.

At the sale (in June-Aug.) of the library of Dr. Bliss, a large number of volumes (still kept separate) were purchased, including a volume of original letters of Charles I, Clarendon, &c., and poems by Lord Fairfax (see p. 97); together with many from the series of books of _Characters_ collected by Dr. Bliss, and from his like series, both of books printed in London shortly before the fire of 1666, and of books printed at Oxford. The Library obtained by his bequest his own interleaved copy of the _Athenae_, with many MS. additions[357].

A copy of the octavo Bible printed by Barker in 1631 (not 1632, as generally said), in which the word 'not' was omitted in the seventh commandment, was bought for 40. For this error (which looks very much like a wicked jest) the printer was fined 1000 marks by the High Commission Court[358], and the edition was rigidly suppressed, all the copies which could be found being condemned to the flames.

Another purchase was a large collection of political tracts in seventy volumes, chiefly relating to foreign affairs, which had been formed by Mr. -- Hamilton, of the Diplomatic Service.

[354] This number includes some fifteen or sixteen volumes given by subsequent donors, but incorporated with Ashmole's own books.

[355] About fifty volumes out of Wood's whole number were missing when the Library became possessed of them.

[356] These were printed by the Wiltshire Archaeological Society in 1862, in one volume quarto, under the editorship of Rev. J. E. Jackson.

[357] A very valuable Index of notes and references on all kinds of biographical, historical, and antiquarian matters, contained in forty small covers, which had been the growth of the many years of Dr. Bliss's literary researches, was bequeathed by him to Rev. H. O. c.o.xe, by whom it is kept in the Library for the use of readers. Several references are made to this Index in the earlier part of the volume.

[358] In Burn's _High Commission Court_, 1865, it is said (from the Reports of proceedings in the Court) that the fine inflicted on Barker was 200 and on Lucas 100. 'With some part of this fine Laud causeth a fair Greek character to be provided, for publishing such ma.n.u.scripts as time and industry should make ready for the publick view; of which sort were the _Catena_ and _Theophylact_ set out by Lyndsell.' Heylin's _Cypria.n.u.s Anglicus_, p. 228.

A.D. 1859.

Numerous MSS., chiefly cla.s.sical, patristic, or Italian, were purchased at the sale of M. Libri's collection in London, in March. Amongst them was a Sacramentary, of the commencement of the ninth century, which was obtained for 43; and a copy of S. Cyprian's Epistles, also of the ninth century, for 84. Four volumes of the correspondence of Scholars at home and abroad with E. H. Barker, of Thetford, were also added to the Library from the sale of Mr. Dawson Turner's library. They are now numbered Bodl. MSS. 1003-1006. And the munificent gift of a very valuable collection of 422 volumes of Arabic and Persian MSS. was received from J. B. Elliott, Esq., of Calcutta. These chiefly consist of the MSS. which Sir Gore Ouseley (who died Nov. 18, 1844,) obtained during his diplomatic service in the East, commencing his collection when stationed at Lucknow, and completing it while amba.s.sador in Persia; of which Mr. Elliott had been the purchaser. A small remaining part had previously been bought by the Library, as noted under 1858. In 1860, Mr. Elliott added to his former gift a series of Eastern coins, and various handsome specimens of Eastern weapons; the latter are now exhibited in a case in the Picture Gallery. Five Sanscrit MSS. were received from Fitz-Edward Hall, Esq., of Saugur, who, at the same time, expressed his munificent intention of presenting hereafter the whole of his large collection.

In this year, after considerable enquiry had been made respecting different modes of cataloguing, and Mr. c.o.xe had reported on the arrangements adopted in the great libraries at home and some of those abroad, it was resolved by the Curators, upon that gentleman's recommendation, that the plan in use in the British Museum should be immediately introduced, for the purpose of commencing a new General Catalogue of all the printed books (excepting the Hebrew, of which a separate catalogue had been made) in the whole Library. By this plan, three or five copies, according as the case may be that of a single or double entry, are written simultaneously on prepared paper, as with a manifold-copier, the transcribers writing out in this way the entries of t.i.tles previously examined and corrected by the cataloguers. The separate t.i.tles are then mounted, arranged in alphabetical order, and bound in volumes. By this plan two copies of the Catalogue are at once written with the labour of one, while surplus slips are also provided for the formation hereafter of a cla.s.sified catalogue as well. The use of the Catalogue, however, is thus confined to the Library itself; and the literary world in general must still refer to the printed Catalogues of 1843 and 1851. A commencement of the new undertaking was made in this year; but it was not until 1862 that the present staff (as to numbers) of a.s.sistants was employed, and the work completely organized. At present the letters A-E, G-H are catalogued; and the extent to which the whole Catalogue will run may be estimated from the fact that the letters B, C, and G fill sixty, sixty-five, and thirty-four volumes respectively. All the books are seen and examined separately; anonymous authors are, if possible, traced out; many errors in previous catalogues are corrected, and the number of entries is very largely increased.

A.D. 1860.

The resignation of the Librarianship by Dr. Bandinel, after forty-seven years of office in the capacity of Head, and a total of fifty of work in the Library, forms a leading feature in the Bodley Annals of this year.

At the age of seventy-nine the natural infirmities of age were felt by himself to be incapacitating him for the duties which he had so long and so regularly discharged, while at the same time the continually increasing pressure of work and enlargement of the Library, made those duties much more onerous than they had been even a quarter of a century before. And so he resolved to withdraw at Michaelmas from the place to which he had been so heartily and entirely devoted, and which under his headship had been doubled in contents. The parting was not without a great struggle; it was the abandoning what had been the cherished occupation of his life, and with the ceasing of that occupation he felt a too-certain foreboding (which he expressed to the writer of these pages) that the life would soon cease as well. A well-merited tribute was paid to him by Convocation in June, in both increasing the amount of his statutable pension, so that he retired on a full stipend, and in specially enrolling him among the Curators of the Library. But he was seldom seen in the old place after his resignation; on two or three occasions only did he again mount the long flight of stairs which had of late tried both his strength and breath severely; and then, when only seven months had elapsed, on Feb. 6, 1861, he pa.s.sed away. And little more than a fortnight previously, on January 20, his old colleague, Professor Reay, departed this life, at the age of seventy-eight. He also had retired on his pension at Michaelmas, 1860, and had been succeeded as Oriental Sub-librarian by Rev. R. Payne Smith (a.s.sistant-librarian in the same department since 1857), whose appointment was confirmed by Convocation on Nov. 22. Memoirs of Dr. Bandinel and Mr. Reay are given in the _Gentleman's Magazine_, (1861, pp. 463-6), which do justice, in the case of the former, to his watchful solicitude for the Library and his thorough acquaintance with it; and in the case of the latter (evidently from intimate personal acquaintance), to his great kindliness of heart, and simplicity and gentleness of character.

The Convocation for the election of Dr. Bandinel's successor was held on November 6, when, with unanimous consent, the Rev. H. O. c.o.xe, M.A., Sub-librarian since 1837, was appointed to the office.

A most seasonable and valuable enlargement of the Library was effected, by an addition which henceforth marks an aera in our Annals. On June 12, Convocation thankfully accepted an offer from the Radcliffe Trustees (which had been first mooted by Dr. Acland in 1856), of the use, as a Bodleian reading-room, of the n.o.ble building hitherto under their control, the existing contents of which had (for the most part) been removed to the New Museum. Dr. Radcliffe's own original intention had been the building an additional wing to the Bodleian rather than the erecting a library of his own; and subsequently the idea had been entertained of devoting his structure to the exclusive reception of ma.n.u.scripts[359]. Its appropriation, therefore, to the Bodleian upon the removal of the library of medicine and natural history, was, in some sort, a return to the founder's first design. And the return came most seasonably, when the old walls of the Schools' quadrangle were well-nigh bursting from a plethora of books, and still the cry 'They come' daily caused fresh bewilderment as to whither those that came should go. It was resolved that the new reading-room thus opportunely gained should be appropriated to new books (arranged under a system of cla.s.sification) and magazines; that it should be called the 'Camera Radcliviana;' and that it should be open from ten A.M. to ten P.M., thus affording the facilities for evening use of the Bodleian which had often been desired for those who were occupied in college work during the day. It was at the close of the year 1861 that the building began to be filled by its new occupants, and on Jan. 27, 1862, (the necessary alterations and preparations having been completed in the short s.p.a.ce of the Christmas vacation) it was announced by the Vice-Chancellor to be open as a Reading Room in connection with the Bodleian. A grant of 200 _per annum_ towards the expense of management was made by Convocation on Nov. 28, 1861, which was increased to 300 in 1865, the remainder of the charge, consisting of the incidental expenses, being defrayed from the general funds of the Library.

A large additional s.p.a.ce for the reception of books was gained by the closing up the open ground-floor (through which was the former entrance to the reading-room), converting the s.p.a.ces between the outer arches into windows, and lining the walls within with book-shelves, thus affording accommodation, according to the present reckoning, for about 50,000 volumes. The whole building may probably be reckoned as capable of containing altogether about 75,000 volumes[360].

The terms on which the Radcliffe Trustees made their offer, and which were accepted by the University, were these:--1. That the Radcliffe Building should be a reading-room to the Bodleian, or be used for any other purpose of the Bodleian Library. 2. That it should remain the property of the Trustees, being esteemed a loan to the University. 3.

That no alteration should be made in the building without consent of the Trustees or a Representative approved by them. 4. That the expense of maintaining the building should be borne by the Trustees.

The transfer of this magnificent room afforded a rare opportunity for developing the usefulness of the Library to which it is now attached, and all who frequent it will acknowledge that that opportunity has been well and worthily improved under the direction of the present Librarian.

On Oct. 25, leave was granted by Convocation for the lending two Laud Ma.n.u.scripts, 561 and 563, being copies of the _Historia Hierosoylmitana_, by Albert of Aix, to the French Government.

At the sale of the library of Dr. Wellesley, Princ.i.p.al of New Inn Hall, a copy of Boccaccio's _Corbaccio_, 1569, was purchased, on account of its possessing the autograph of Sir Thomas Bodley, to whom it had been given by the editor, J. Corbinelli.

A rare Salisbury _Primer_, printed at Rouen by Rob. Valentin in 1556, was purchased for 22. Its t.i.tle affords an amusing specimen of a foreigner's mode of printing English; it runs thus--_This prymer of Salisbury vse is se tout along with houtonyser chyng, with many prayers & goodly pyctures._ It is intended hereby to be conveyed to the English reader that, without any searching, he will find his prayers and psalms set out in their proper order.

[359] In prosecution of this idea several valuable collections of Oriental MSS. were obtained, which still form part of the stores of the old Radcliffe Library. They consist of the Arabic, Persian, and Sanscrit MSS. collected by -- Frazer and by Sale, the translator of the Koran, which were obtained (as we learn from Sharpe's _Prolegomena_ to Hyde's _Dissertationes_, 1767, vol. i. p. xvii.) through Professor Thomas Hunt, at the suggestion of Dr. Gregory Sharpe; and of the collations of the MSS. of the Hebrew Old Test. by Dr. Kennicott (Librarian 1767-1783), together with his correspondence and miscellaneous _codices_. The Sanscrit MSS. of Frazer and Sale are described in Prof. Aufrecht's catalogue. Other collections in the Radcliffe Library are the cla.s.sical and historical (as well as medical) books of Dr. Frewin, a physician and Camden Professor of Anc. History; and the law books of Mr. Viner, founder of the Vinerian Professorship and Scholarships; together with the works of J. Gibbs, the justly famous architect of the building in which they were kept, and some coins bequeathed by Wise, the first Librarian. Two volumes of Clarendon MSS. were bought for the Library in 1780, but were united some years since to the ma.s.s of those papers preserved in the Bodleian. It was not until the year 1811 that the Library was specially a.s.signed to Medicine and Natural History. (See _Report on the transfer of the Radcliffe Library to the Univ. Museum_, by Dr. Acland, 1861.)

[360] An account of this a.s.signment and arrangement of the Radcliffe Library, as also of the transfer of the Ashmolean books to the Bodleian, appeared in the _Athenaeum_ for Jan. 1865, p. 20.

A.D. 1861.

One hundred and four volumes of Tamil MSS. were purchased; as well as four Samaritan MSS. of the Pentateuch, of the twelfth century, which had been brought to England by a native of Samaria.

The Syriac MSS. of the well-known Orientalist, Dr. Bernstein, were purchased by the Delegates of the Press, with a view to a.s.sisting in the great work of a Syriac Lexicon, upon which Mr. (now Dr.) Payne Smith was (and still is) engaged.

The printing of the Annual Catalogues of purchases was discontinued, after the issue of the Catalogue for this year. Written registers are now kept in the Library of all the books bought in the course of each year; and only a list of benefactors, with the statement of accounts, is annually printed for circulation in the University and amongst donors.

A.D. 1862.

A large collection of British Essayists and Periodicals was presented by the late Rev. F. W. Hope, D.C.L., the munificent benefactor to the University Museum, the founder of the Professorship of Zoology, and the donor also of a large collection of engraved portraits and other prints[361]. The collection was one which had been formed by John Thomas Hope, Esq., the donor's father. It contains some 760 specimens of its cla.s.s of literature, belonging chiefly to the eighteenth century.

Special thanks for the gift were returned by Convocation, on Feb. 20. A catalogue, which had been drawn up for Mr. Hope by Mr. Jacob Henry Burn, containing notices in detail of the various publications, was printed at the University Press, in 1865, in an octavo volume.

A Hebrew MS. of the Pentateuch, probably of the thirteenth century, was bought for 32 10_s._ Some tracts relating to the period of the Great Rebellion were bought at the sale of Dr. Bandinel's extensive Caroline collection.

On March 4, the Curators accepted the gift of a bust of Rev. F. W.

Robertson, late inc.u.mbent of Trinity Chapel, Brighton, which had been purchased by subscription. It is now placed in the Picture Gallery.

A large number of purchase-duplicates, which had acc.u.mulated during the course of many years, were removed from the Library and sold by auction, in London, by Messrs. Sotheby and Wilkinson, in May. Among them were some of great rarity. The sale, which lasted five days, produced 766 2_s._ 6_d._; of which 110 5_s._ were given for a specimen of the St.

Alban's press, the _Rhetorica Nova_ of Gul. de Saona, printed in 1489.

A second and smaller sale, containing many English works of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, took place on April 12, 1865, at which a copy of Chettle's _Kind-Harts Dreame_ (1593), produced 101, and Decker's _Guls Horne-Booke_, 1609, 81. The proceeds of the whole sale amounted to 750 18_s._ 6_d._

The Rev. Alfred Hackman, M.A., Chaplain and Precentor of Ch. Ch., and P.

C. of St. Paul's, Oxford, and an a.s.sistant in the Library of twenty-five years' standing, was approved by Convocation, on April 12, as Mr. c.o.xe's successor in the Sub-librarianship; after a discussion, which led to the abrogation by Convocation, in February, of a provision in the Statutes forbidding the holding cure of souls in connection with that office or that of Head-librarian without special licence from the Curators.

[361] These engravings are deposited in the gallery of the Radcliffe, under the charge of a separate Keeper, the Rev. J. Treacher, M.A. They do not belong to the Bodleian.

A.D. 1863.

Among the purchases made in this year were the following: Card. Ximenes'

rare treatise ent.i.tled _Crestia_, printed at Valentia in 1483 (25); Court-Rolls of Tamworth, Solihull, and other neighbouring places, obtained from Mr. Halliwell; and a collection, in three thick folio volumes, of placards, hand-bills, &c., relating to the town of Coventry, formed by Mr. W. Reader, a printer in that place.

Capt. Montagu Montagu, R.N., who died at Bath, on July 3 in this year, bequeathed a collection of about 700 volumes, in various branches of literature, which was received at the Library about the beginning of 1864. There are about ninety editions and versions of the Psalter, with works on Psalmody, including a metrical version by Capt. Montagu himself; a large number of editions of Anacreon, Horace, Juvenal, Phaedrus, Petrarch, Boileau, and Fontaine's _Fables_; a few MSS. of Juvenal, Petrarch, &c. with a large series of autograph letters, chiefly obtained at Upcott's sale. There are, besides, a number of topographical and biographical works ill.u.s.trated, _more Sutherlandico_, with additional engravings, together with many parcels of separate prints arranged for the same purpose. One item of particular interest which accompanied the collection is a small sketch of Napoleon I, in profile, admirably executed by the well-known Italian artist, Giuseppe Longhi. It now hangs, framed and glazed, in the Library, together with a letter from Longhi himself, in French, dated at Milan, June 4, 1828, in which he narrates the occasion on which it was taken. He attended, in 1801, at Lyons, as a member of the 'Consulte Cisalpine,' for the settling the affairs of the Republic of Italy, under the presidency of the First Consul. It happened that during the delivery of a long harangue, full of tedious flattery, Napoleon sat _vis-a-vis_ with the orator; and Longhi saw that an opportunity for exercising the cunning of his pencil had come. The light, which streamed in through the great window of the Church (!) where they were a.s.sembled, brought out the profile very clearly; there was little fear of being cut short by the speaker's suddenly ceasing his declamation, or of being interrupted by movement on the part of the unconscious subject of the operation, for the latter sat immersed in thought upon matters far away, while regarding the speaker with a pensive air; and so, while Napoleon sat pondering, Longhi sat sketching. And everybody, he declares with a pardonable pride, at Lyons and Paris, p.r.o.nounced the likeness to be excellent. A small bust of Napoleon, now placed in the great window, came to the Library at the same time. A catalogue of Capt. Montagu's books, comprising forty octavo pages, was printed and circulated with the Annual Statement for 1864.