Wednsday the 11th, Ditto.-Lei fu matto in maggior segno (I was enraged with her to the greatest degree).-Susan Poplar went away this night at 8 o'clock, without taking leave.

The 10th Ditto. (May, 1701,) I was sensible of the gout being come into my right woh I streind three days agoe looking after Ben, and was forced to come away from Dorch' in great paine by 2 o'clock. This evening I applyed oatmeal poultice to it and had a very uneasy night.-[And, as if the anguish of his gout was not enough for him,] Qta sera A. tamando-fu mata in maggior segno per niente. (This evening A. taking—was mad to the greatest degree for nothing.)

Munday, the 19th (May, 1701).-Hoggidi A. eveniva matta altravolta in maggior segno e mi trattava come un schiavo p. niente.

(To-day A. became mad again, to the greatest degree, and treated me like a slave for nothing.)

Munday, the 26 Ditto (May, 1701).-Mary Lillington came hither. Sunday, the 29th Ditto (June, 1701).-Besai M. L. prma vez. (I kissed M. L. the first time).

[Who could M. L. be but Mary Lillington, who came the 26th of May ? The first time, too, as if he meant to do it again. He had said before that Mrs. Richards had treated him like a slave, per niente, for nothing. For nothing, forsooth !]

B.

(To be continued.)

HOUSEHOLD INVENTORY OF THE FIFTEENTH CENTURY.

(FROM A MANUSCRIPT IN PRIVATE HANDS.)

THES parcelles her after wretyn ben in my place in litill Barw (?), that is for to sey, in the halle and in the parlour, and in the chambre above and benethe, in the botry, and in the lardirhous, and in the kechyn, wretyn with mine own hand the xv day of May, Anno Domini m1 iiije lxiijo

[There is nothing in the original manuscript to enable us to identify the writer.]

W.

Communications and Correspondence.

OUR OLD PUBLIC LIBRARIES.

AN inquiry is urgently demanded into the numerous and valuable collections of books belonging to the public, which are scattered over the country, in the hands of trustees, either official, or by descent in certain families, or by nomination; and all of which come under the title of public libraries. In the reign of Queen Anne-our Augustan age--these important institutions were brought before Parliament, and a law was passed for their better preservation. This statute (7 Anne, c. 14) provides that the incumbents of parishes and the churchwardens shall give security to the civil authorities for the care of the books. It also invests the bishops and other ecclesiastics with power to visit the libraries; and it enjoins the librarians, once a year, to certify to their good state.

The fact of such a law being made one hundred and forty-two years ago, is a satisfactory proof that public libraries were not wanting among us of old. They are indeed to be traced to remote times; and, instead of deserving the common contemptuous designation of "mere repositories of musty divinity and crabbed Latin," they are often of great literary and scientific value. They are curiously characterised, too, by tokens of dedication to public use. In the will of the venerable Judge Littleton, whose "Tenures are so well known from Lord Coke's "Commentary," a black-letter volume of the fifteenth century-a Poem-bequeathed to a Worcestershire village-is expressly directed to be always chained. It was at all times to be open to "the

priest and OTHERS," to be read in the parish church. So, in St. Nicholas's Church, in Hereford, a later bequest, of some hundreds of volumes, is subject to the condition of their being chained to the shelves, as if the readers were expected to be of a very miscellaneous description. The precaution of chaining up the books in their shelves has not always saved them from waste, seeing that many a stray volume is to be seen elsewhere, with the iron ring at the back, to which the chain is no longer attached.

Popular contributions were usual modes of forming our old public libraries. At Hereford again, about the year 1620, the Choral library was collected from all ranks in society, and it was certainly intended for the use of all. Some of its best books, those on Geography and Voyages, were given by an able diplomatist, Lord Scudamore, and by several natives of the county settled as merchants in Bristol and London.

Like instances are frequent, from one end of the land to the other; and the variety of the founders of these institutions are instructive illustrations of the mental efforts that have helped to make us what our British people are. The will of Walworth, the bold lord mayor of London who killed Wat Tyler at Blackheath, shows, in the catalogue of his books, the sort of reading usual with the great citizens of the metropolis in the fourteenth century; as the contributions levied by the great Duke of Bedford, in the next century, in the royal library of the Louvre, shows the anxiety that prevailed to add to our few literary resources; and as the donation of Judge Littleton's, above alluded to, shows the desire that the country people should be amused whilst they were taught. A Surgeon gave the chained books to the parishioners of St. Nicholas, Hereford. A Physician gave a most valuable collection to the people of Preston, in Lancashire; and the men of Manchester doubtless owe something of their enlightened character to the excellent Humphry Cheetham, their fellow-townsman of the seventeenth century, whose library was a good precursor to the free lending library just opened so brilliantly. The free lending library at Bamburgh Castle was founded by Lord Carew, Bishop of Durham, and increased by Archbishop Sharpe, brother to the devoted friend. of the whole human race, Granville Sharpe. At the beginning of the last century, Dr. Bray alone founded fifty, and his associates afterwards 105, lending libraries.

These good men were before their age; and to do them honour will, of itself, repay the pains of inquiring into the present condition of their benefactions, which it is a chief object of this paper to recommend.

A most important object is to turn their libraries to the uses which these founders would have been the foremost to approve, and which are in harmony with the wants of the present day.

A particular example will conveniently illustrate the subject, and show that not only our manufacturers in the north, but our rural population also, can be provided with literary resources and scientific instruction at the firesides of the remotest hamlets.

The free lending library at Henley-on-Thames, was founded a few years after the date of the act of Queen Anne, by Dr. Charles Aldrich, nephew to the very learned and accomplished Dean of Christ Church, Dr. Henry Aldrich. Dr. Charles Aldrich died rector of Henley, in 1737. He edited Theophrastus and other Classics, published by the University of Oxford; and his "study of books," as his will modestly terms the fine library here given to the public, bears ample testimony to the great extent of his acquirements

and the purity of his taste. "I bequeath," it says, "all my study of books to the rectory of Henley, being desirous of laying the foundation of a parochial library, begging my successor and the parish to provide a room for them, if God should not spare my life to do so.

Every branch of learning and science is represented in this collection, with all the languages, ancient and modern, European and Oriental; with painting, music, horticulture, agriculture, mechanics, engineering, medicine, anatomy, architecture, history, antiquities, voyages, philosophy, and religion.

Forty years after its foundation, namely, in 1777, the Bishop of Oxford promulgated the rules which now govern it. They entitle the inhabitants of Henley and the neighbouring parishes to read the books in the library, and to borrow them; and it was anticipated that proper additions to the collection, from time to time, would be made.

The character of this old library may be inferred from the following specimens in different departments :

Voyages and Ethnology.-De Bry, 1590-1606; De Laet, 1633; Hackluyt, 1599; Purchas, 1625; Kircher, 1667; Wafer, 1699 Dampier.

Mathematics and Natural Philosophy.-Galileo's Works, 1656; Bacon's Works, 1665; Otto v. Guericke's Experiments, 1665; Transactions of the Royal Society; Flamsteed's Astronomy, 1729; Wallis's Works, 1695.

Botany and Natural History.-Morison's Plants, 1680; Willoughby's Birds of Prey, 1678; Vesalius's Anatomy, 1617; Bidloo's Anatomical Plates. Languages.-Walton's Polyglot Collection, 1657; Arabic Lexicon, 1653; Ludolf's Ethiopic Lexicon, 1661; Calepin's Dictionary of eight languages; Pocock's Arabic Works; Turkish Testament; Hebrew Lexicon; Welsh Dictionary.

Antiquities, Fine Arts, and Poetry.-Marmora Arundelia, 1676; Egyptian Hieroglyphics, 1590; Subterranea Romæ, 1659; the Paintings of the Antients, 1694; Albert Durer's Geometry, 1605; Grevius's Antiquities, 1694; Grevius's Inscriptions, 1707; Dean Aldrich's Architecture, 1690; Chaucer's Works, 15-; Ben Jonson's Works, 1640; Cabinet of Sculpture, 1699; Tasso, in folio, 1617.

The Classics include Delphin, Elzevir, and Stephan editions; the Divinity extends to all creeds and all sects.

Mr. Ewart could not do a more patriotic work than to extend the principles of his excellent law beyond "cities with 10,000 inhabitants," to every post town, with its rural neighbourhood. A proper inquiry will show that the old public libraries already reported to his Committee are far short of the number that exist in the country; and besides the DISTRIBUTION of books provided for by the Scottish itinerating libraries, by the Religious Tract Society, and the like, other suitable agencies are at our command for these purposes at a cheap rate. Enough, indeed, is accomplished to secure complete success in this important matter; so as to bring the best sources of amusement and instruction to the firesides of the remotest hamlet. S. B.

THE

RETROSPECTIVE REVIEW.

ART. I.-Pyrrhonism of Joseph Glanvill.

Scepsis Scientifica; or, confest Ignorance the way to Science. In an Essay on the Vanity of DOGMATIZING, and CONFIDENT Opinion. With A REPLY to the EXCEPTIONS of the learned THOMAS ALBIUS. By JOSEPH GLANVILL, M.A. London: Printed by E. Cotes, for Henry Eversden, at the Gray-Hound, in St. Paul's Churchyard. M.DC.Lxv.

MR. R. GLANVILL, we believe, was one of the earliest members of the Royal Society, to whom he dedicates his book. He was born at Plymouth, in 1636, and educated at Exeter and Lincoln Colleges, Oxford; and died rector of the Abbey Church, Bath, in 1680. At the time our copy of Mr. Glanvill's book was printed, the Royal Society, to whom he recommends it, had not received their first charter more than three or four years. His dedication is a long one, of more than twenty-four pages, in one of which he tells his learned brethren, that he thinks it "needless to endeavour to celebrate them in a profest encomium; since customary strains and affected juvenilities have made it difficult to commend and speak credibly in dedications;" but yet he plays off compliments upon them in twenty other pages, though, whether he mean them for a "profest encomium," or for instances of the difficulty of credible speaking, he has not told us. He says truly of the pleasures of experimental onsearchings into the works of Nature, that those who follow them will "find all the innocent satisfactions which use to follow victory, variety, and surprise, the usual sources of our best tasted pleasures; and perhaps human nature meets few more sweetly relishing and cleanly joyes, than those that derive from the happy issues of successful trials." And we believe that the king who offered a great reward for the discovery of a new pleasure, could never have known, like Archimedes at his first insight I.-2. 8