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ART. V.-An Account of the most Important Public Records of Great Britain, and the Publications of the Record Commissioners: together with other Miscellaneous, Historical, and Antiquarian Information. Compiled from various printed Books and Manuscripts. By C. P. Cooper, Esq. 2 vols. London: Baldwin and Cradock. 1832.

If it were not for the pitiless pelting of declamation, which we should inevitably bring down upon our heads by venturing on the avowal, we are by no means sure that we should not rank the Khalif Omar among the benefactors of Mankind. Despair, it is said, is one of the first sentiments which occupies the heart of an ambitious tyro in Letters when he surveys the boundless contents of the Bodleian or the Vatican: but if the span of a single life be incommensurate with the toil demanded for close acquaintance with even those comparatively puny collections, what would be all Time, from Creation till Doomsday, to any one whose zeal prompted him to lick up all that Physic of the Soul which was. once deposited in the Library of Alexandria? "Vain man would be wise, though he be born like a wild-ass's colt!"

A question also may be fairly raised as to the real value of our loss. Of the lamented fuel which Abulpharagius would persuade us fed the stoves of 4000 baths during a period of six months, how much was there worth preserving for other and better purposes? Have we to bewail the suppression of any important Truth, the retardation of any useful discovery, the blighting of any precious fruit of Genius, by the fanaticism of the Arabian Conqueror? or is it not more probable that the tears of History, Poetry, and Philosophy, have been shed idly and without cause? If indeed a judgment may be correctly formed from the occasional glimpses which the uninitiated sometimes obtain into modern repositories of emeritus paper and parchment, very little is ever forgotten which is at all worthy of being kept in remembrance. Curiosity may expatiate without end, and Imagination may revel without controul on Ghosts and Phantoms of the deperdita;—many a pointed sentence and ambitious paragraph may sigh over the irreparable wreck which Learning has sustained from the ravages, whether of Age or of Barbarism;-yet, in spite of glowing periods and glittering apostrophes, of the imputation of lack of taste and of more than Vandal insensibility, we are inclined to believe, in all sobriety, that, for the most part, whenever a contest is maintained between Time on the one hand, and Thomas Hearne and Co. on the other, the former will not

only command success, but he will be pretty sure also to deserve it.

Whatever may be the general value of this opinion, it assuredly receives very strong confirmation from the volumes before us, which have called out its present expression. They are a compilation from a great variety of sources, put together by an Antiquary, apparently well-skilled, certainly most ardent in his favourite pursuit; and they contain an account, derived from printed documents and manuscript collections, of the most important Records preserved in Great Britain. Several of these, no doubt, are beyond all price; and we are as profoundly impressed with a due feeling of their altogether inestimable value as the veriest Magliabecchi of the day; but it is equally plain, we think-and our conviction arises mainly from Mr. Cooper's evidence, notwithstanding the surprise which such a declaration may excite in him-that by far the greater portion may be safely allowed to slumber, blattarum et tinearum epula, in the dirt, dust and damp which are usually reputed their natural adjuncts. We would not, with Hugh Peters, sign the warrant for their delivery to the secular arm as "monuments of tyranny;" nay farther, we should rejoice if any pains-taking gentlemen would examine, arrange, and catalogue them; if a Committee, not composed of those searchers, would determine whether any, and which of them, possessed sufficient general interest to demand publication. Such a process would not only rescue from the hazard of destruction whatever might be worthy of preservation, but yet more it would effectually dispel a prevalent delusion, that there is much which ought to be preserved.

In offering to our readers some notice of the contents of Mr. Cooper's volumes, it will be unnecessary to refer to its original owners that which he has borrowed from others. Whatever he cites from "MS. Collections," which we suppose to be his own peculiar property, we shall carefully appropriate to its rightful

master.

Bishop Nicholson has stated, that the Public Records of England excel in age, beauty, correctness, and authority, all other European Archives. With the exception of the Golden Bull, which bears the date of 1356, no Constitution is preserved in the ·Code des Recès de l'Empire more ancient than the middle of the XVth Century. The Emperors indeed and the Kings of France bore about with them the National Records as part of their travelling and military equipage; and the custom was not laid aside by the latter Princes, till, in a rencontre between our Richard I. and Philippe Auguste at Freteval, between Châteaudun and

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Vendôme, the rear-guard of the French army was defeated, and the archives of the kingdom were captured, together with the rest of the Royal baggage. Etrange coutume," as Henault is well justified in exclaiming, " de nos Rois de porter alors à la guerre les titres les plus précieux de leur Couronne!" Mezeray contents himself by remarking, that the Grand Signor does the same; and Mr. Cooper incorrectly traces the custom to the Roman Cæsars, "who," he says, were attended in their wars and in their journeys by the Scrinia Viatoria, transported their records with their Courts, and the consequence was that they were frequently lost and dispersed."—vol. i. p. 2. For this statement, which we think altogether mistaken, Budæus (whom Mr. Cooper strangely calls Buddeus) is cited as an authority in his Notes on the Pandects, p. 162. Budæus certainly there distinguishes between Scrinia Viatoria and Scrinia Stataria. But in what manner? not by any means as if they were travelling Record Offices :-" Altera sunt Scrinia Viatoria, quæ in Comitatu Principali circumferuntur, in quibus libelli supplices Principi a postulantibus porrecti conduntur quoad subscribantur; id est, quoad Principi vacet libellis et postulantibus operam dare, libellisque responsitare."--p. 163. The Scrinia Stataria were the permanent State Paper Offices, and we very much doubt whether the Imperial Archives were ever removed from them. We also believe that the Scrinia Viatoria-if any such phrase be recognized, as we believe it is not, by any Roman writer-were, as Budæus has stated, nothing more than the cabinets in which the Emperors and their Generals deposited their private papers, and the Petitions and other public documents which they might receive during their progresses and campaigns. Thus we read in Pliny, (vii. 26,) that Julius Cæsar, captis apud Pharsaliam Pompeii Magni Scriniis epistolarum,with far nobler feeling than that exhibited by the low-bred, crop-eared Robbers, after a similar booty at Naseby,-burned all their contents unread. So also Alexander Severus is said, by his Biographer Lampridius, to have employed his afternoons in the perusal and signature of papers, relegentibus cuncta Librariis et iis qui Scrinium gerebant.-(p. 31.) No one can pretend that Scrinium here means anything more than the Blue-leather despatch-box which is forwarded from Downing Street to Windsor; and the papers to which Alexander listened and affixed his name were the current ordinances of the day, not the ancient Archives of the State. We do not remember any instance in Roman History in which the Emperors composed themselves to an afternoon nap by an opiate similar to that which was used by King Abasuerus: "On that night could not the King sleep, who commanded to bring the Book of the records of the Chronicles, and they were read before the King."

But to return from this digression. With the exception of certain interruptions in the troublous reigns of Stephen and of John, we possess, as Mr. Cooper informs us, authentic Instruments from the time of the Conquest, and Parliamentary Records and proceedings from a date but little subsequent to it. Of the little use which popular writers of History have made of these documents, and no writers ought to have had so constant recourse to them,-Mr. Cooper adduces a striking proof. Out of fifteen Historians who mention the Domesday Book, four assign the date to 1083, one to 1084, seven to 1086, and two to 1087. We may add, that if any of these indolent conjecturers, or adopters of second-hand authority, would have taken the trouble of referring to a memorial of the completion of the Survey, at the end of the second volume of the original MS. in the Chapter House at Westminster, they would have seen distinctly that it was finished in 1086. The assertion is confirmed by much internal evidence in the body itself of the Record.

Public attention was very little drawn to our National Records till the appearance of the Selection of State Papers edited by Rymer, in the time of Queen Anne, at the advice of Harley and Lord Halifax, and under the sanction of Royal Authority. In 1731, after the fire in the Cottonian Library, an elaborate Report was drawn up by a Committee of the House of Commons on the state of the various repositories of the Public Records; but it is to the Commission appointed by George III. in 1800, and subsequently renewed, that we are indebted for the fullest and most important information concerning them.

The Collection of MSS. named Cottonian, from its founder, was formed in the time of James I. by Sir Robert Cotton, a gentleman of ancient family, of Conington in Huntingdonshire. Addicted to the tranquil pursuits of Antiquities and Literature, that excellent and amiable man was nevertheless unable to escape suspicion of political intrigue; and on one occasion, in 1615, he was peremptorily excluded, by an Order of the Privy Council, from his own Library, which was carefully locked up as containing papers of too great importance to be submitted to general inspection. This most cruel and iniquitous exercise of arbitrary power was repeated, in 1629, when a MS. Tract, calculated to bring the Sovereign into disrepute, was traced to an original copy in Sir R. Cotton's possession. The offensive paper had been written several years before, in a somewhat different form, by Robert Dudley, Duke of Northumberland. Sir Robert Cotton was ignorant that it was on his shelves; and the copy which had crept abroad was obtained by the surreptitious transcription of his Librarian. This second debarment from his treasures broke

the old man's heart, and shortly before his death, which occurred in 1631, he signified to the Privy Council" that their so long detaining his books from him, without rendering any reason for the same, had been the cause of his mortal malady." The sequestration was continued during a part of the life of his son and successor; and in that of his grandson, Sir John Cotton, the Catalogue of the Collection was first compiled and printed. The Books, it seems, were deposited in fourteen Presses, surmounted with Busts of the twelve Cæsars and of Cleopatra and Faustina; and these Press-marks, having been retained, form the references to the present day. In 1700 Sir John Cotton signified his willingness, in pursuance of the intentions of his Father and Grandfather, that the Library then preserved in a House called Cotton House, in the neighbourhood of the Houses of Parliament at Westminster, should be kept and preserved for public use and advantage; and an Act of Parliament accordingly passed, in the Preamble of which the Collection is said to be "of great use and service for the knowledge and preservation of our Constitution in Church and State, and generally esteemed the best of its kind now anywhere extant." On the death of Sir John, the House and Library were vested in Trustees. The House was in ill condition; and, probably with the intention of erecting a new mansion on the old site, the Books were removed, in 1712, to Essex House in Essex Street in the Strand. Had the projected building been a Gaol, a Barrack, or an Office connected with the payment of Revenue, it would have been rapidly completed; but English Governments have ever been snail-paced in the construc tion of National Galleries, Libraries and Museums. We are not surprised, therefore, to learn, that in 1730 the Collection again migrated to Little Dean's Yard, Westminster, where it was deposited in an old House purchased from Lord Ashburnham. Here, in the following year, it suffered greatly, and was nearly altogether destroyed, by an accidental fire; yet even that warning was insufficient to obtain a permanent provision for the safety of these treasures, and they were conveyed in their half-roasted state to a temporary residence in the Dormitory of the Westminster King's Scholars. On the establishment of the British Museum they were once again removed to another old House; and it was not until our own time that they obtained a fit repository in a part of those magnificent buildings now in progress-still too tardy progress-for the reception of our National Collections.

The Cottonian Library, consisting originally of 938 volumes, was reduced by the Fire to 861, of which, when brought to the Museum, 105 were no more than damaged bundles: 51 of these have been in great measure restored, "the remaining 61," says

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