Only Five Hundred Copies of this Work have been

printed, of which Four Hundred and Fifty Copies, signed and numbered, are for sale in England and America.

This Copy is ...15 1.

H. J. Moule.

Who faulteth not, liueth not; who mendeth faults is commended: The Printer hath faulted a little: it may be the author ouersighted more. Thy paine (Reader) is the least; then erre not thou most by misconstruing or sharpe censuring; least thou be more vncharitable, then either of them hath been heedlesse: God amend and guide vs all.

F. ROBARTES ON TYTHES CAMBRIDGE, 1613.

PREFACE

THE ORIGIN AND GROWTH OF THE LIBRARY

THE Bible House Library dates back to the year of the Society's foundation. On 17 December 1804, the Committee resolved to issue an appeal 'soliciting donations of Bibles, Testaments, or portions of the Scriptures, in the ancient or modern languages' for the use of agents and members of the Society. One of the first to respond was Mr. Granville Sharp, who promptly sent in between thirty and forty volumes, including versions in Arabic, Dutch, Caledonian or Scotch Gaelic,' Gothic, Malabar, Mohawk, Hutter's Matthew and Mark in thirteen languages, and a copy of John Eliot's Virginian Indian Bible.' This generous example was followed year after year by numerous benefactors, and a list of Donations to the Library' has been a feature in each succeeding Annual Report. Among the donors occur such names as Mr. William Blair, Dr. Adam Clarke, the Rev. Joseph Hughes, the Rev. John Noble Coleman, the Rev. Dr. E. Henderson, Mr. James Thomson, the Rev. John Jones, Mr. George Stokes, General Colin Macaulay, Lord Bexley, Mr. Samuel Bagster, the Baron Silvestre de Sacy, Mr. Josiah Forster, Mr. Edward Dalton, and Prince Louis Lucien Bonaparte. The Library was also gradually increased by copies of new versions and editions published by the Society, and by gifts from other religious, missionary, and learned institutions, at home and abroad. Besides printed editions of the Scriptures, the collection came to embrace a certain number of Biblical and other manuscripts, as well as numerous grammars, lexicons and philological works, chiefly for the use of the Society's translators and revisers.

EARLIER CATALOGUES

The earliest printed list of the Library occupies fourteen pages after the title to Vol. I (1805-10) of the Society's reprinted Annual Reports, and enumerates some 450 volumes. The first catalogue proper was issued in 1822, in pamphlet form, and also appears as pp. 112-144 of the Annual Report for that year. A longer list, filling 86 pages, was published in 1832. At length in 1855 Mr. George Bullen, afterwards Keeper of Printed Books at the British Museum, was commissioned by the Committee to prepare a complete Catalogue

of the Society's Library, which by that time had grown to about 5000 volumes in more than 150 different languages. Mr. Bullen followed the plan of the British Museum, arranging all printed editions of the Scriptures under (i) Complete Bibles in various languages, (ii) Old Testaments, (iii) Separate Parts of the Old Testament, (iv) Apocrypha, (v) New Testaments, (vi) Separate Parts of the New Testament. Under each of these headings the books were grouped in the following linguistic order: (a) polyglots, (b) original languages, (c) Latin, (d) English, (e) other languages in alphabetical order.

THE FRY COLLECTION

Since the publication of Mr. Bullen's Catalogue in 1857, the Library has more than doubled in size, partly by the increase of missionary versions of the Scriptures, until it now includes books in over four hundred different languages and dialects. It has been further enriched by the acquisition in 1890 of the unique collection of English Bibles which had been brought together by Mr. Francis Fry of Bristol. This embraced over 1200 volumes of the Scriptures in English, together with specimens of the principal editions in Welsh, Irish, Gaelic, and Anglo-Saxon, and represented many years of patient research and lavish expenditure. Regarding these books Mr. Bullen wrote: So important a collection was, I have no hesitation in saying, never before brought together by a private individual; and for English Bibles, I know of none anywhere existing that can compare with it, whether in public or in private libraries.' Through the persevering zeal of Dr. William Wright, then Editorial Superintendent, this treasure was secured unbroken for the Library, at a cost of 6000l. The sum was raised by special contributions from friends of the Society, including munificent gifts from members of Mr. Fry's family.

THE PRESENT CATALOGUE

In 1899, in view of the Society's approaching Centenary, the Committee entrusted the present writer with the task of preparing a new Historical Catalogue of the Bible House Library, and appointed Mr. Horace Moule to assist him in the work. In drawing up their plan, the compilers received valuable advice from Dr. Richard Garnett, C.B., Dr. W. Robertson Nicoll, Dr. J. Rendel Harris, Dr. C. Hagberg Wright, and the late Rev. J. Gordon Watt. It was decided to confine the Catalogue to Printed Editions of Holy Scripture, reserving other books in the Library for separate treatment. Under each language-heading, all editions--whether complete Bibles, Testaments, or separate portions-are arranged in strictly chronological order according to their dates of publication. This method exhibits the history of Bible translation in any tongue, and has peculiar value as tracing the evolution of those missionary versions which the Society specially exists to promote. In order to make the sequence complete, we have endeavoured to note each vital link in the lineage