and Gospels for Sundays and Festivals throughout the year, are particularly marked and described in rubric as they occur in this Bible. This I have not observed in any other copy.

Instead of Marginal Readings, there is often an explanation of a word or phrase given, and a line drawn under it, to point out what the word in the Text means. Such are certainly some of the earliest Notes on the Bible.

As the Pages on which a Book commences are always highly illuminated, there have been made some depredations on them; the following leaves are cut out, 1, leaf containing from 1 John v. 9. to Jude 4.-2, another leaf containing from 1 Cor. 1. to cap. iii. v. 9.-3, a third leaf containing the Epistle to Titus, the two last verses excepted. In these three places three stout leaves of fine vellum, ruled to the pattern are inserted. In the first place the text of the three witnesses has just escaped from the execrable hands of the mutilators :"And the Spirit is he that witnessith, for Crist is treuthe; for three ben that geven witnessing in heven, the Fadir, the Moord, or the Sone, and the Hooly Goost, & these three ben oon. And three ben that geven witnessing in Erthe, the Spirit, Water & Blood, & these three ben oon. Gif we resceyve witnessinge.” These are the last words on the page before the abstracted leaf.

On the whole of the Evidence it would appear that this is the most important copy of this Translation now extant, as it can be traced up nearly, if not quite, to the time of the Translator, and belonged to that Family from which he received his countenance and support; and without which, he and his followers humanly speaking, must have been annihilated. The language also is older than that in most of the copies which pass under the name of Wiclif.

XXIII. A LATIN DICTIONARY.

A large thin square Folio, containing the words of a Latin Dictionary, written in a very neat modern hand, intended to have been Latin, (deriving the words and telling how often they occurred,) English, French, Italian, and Spanish.-Very little of the design is fulfilled.

XXIV. BIBLIA SACRA Vulgatæ Versionis.

This is a good MS. of the 12th century, on a good vellum, with little ornament. This MS. and the others hereafter to be described, prove the corruptions, interpolations and omissions in the Bibles put forth by the Authorities of the Romish Church, especially those last ones issued by, and accompanied with the bull of, Pope Sixtus V, in A.D. 1589, declared as the standard text of the Vulgate, and as authorized by the Council of Trent; and that published by Pope Clement VIII, in A.D. 1592, as a correction of Pope Sixtus' edition which was declared to be inaccurate, and therefore to be suppressed! It is defective from Job. c. 33. v. 15, to the end of the Psalms, and from I Maccab. c. 11. v. 35, the whole of II. Maccab, Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, Acts, and James; all of which has been supplied from another MS. remarkably similar to the present one. At the conclusion is a fragment of I Maccab. c. 3. to cap. 5, and two leaves of the 14th cap. of St. John. Folio, bound in Russia, pp. 584.

XXV. BIBLIA SACRA Vulgatæ Versionis.

This MS. is singularly beautiful and exquisitely written upon the finest vellum: the initial letters of chapters, &c. are highly ornamented with red and blue penmanship, and the beginnings

of Books are splendidly illuminated in gold and colours. It formerly belonged "Bibliothecæ Monasterii Montis Sancti Eligii," of which one George Bellot appears to have been at some time the Abbot, and who gave this book to J. Mailliet in the year (unfortunately partly erased in the old entry at the end of of this MS. from which this account is taken) the 6th of June. There are one hundred illuminated pages in this volume, containing, besides flowered Capitals, one hundred and six small miniatures. Sæc. XIV. Folio, written on the finest and most delicate vellum, bound in crimson velvet, pp. 800.

The accompanying plate is a specimen of the way in which each Book begins: the subjects are, David playing before Saul, and cutting off the head of Goliah. The whole is painted in brilliant colors, and all that in the wood-cut is left white, is in the original thickly raised burnished gold. See Plate II.

XXVI.

CONSTITUTIONES JUSTINIANI Im

peratoris.

It commences thus in Rubric; "in nomine Domini nostri Jesu Christi, Constitutio Domini prima Justioni sacratissimi Principis, Johanni Prefecto Pretorio Secundo de Heredibus Falcidia, Rubrica."

Immediately under this Rubric is a well executed Miniature, in which the Emperor is represented sitting in his chair of state, several of his Courtiers standing before him, who seem all intent upon the introduction of a little boy, on whom each appears to fix his attention, and to place his hopes. They are all dressed in appropriate robes: the heads appear behind the Emperor's and child's.

In addition to the above there is a great number of the most