, when they were sold to pay expenses, and so came
into the possession of the excellent Solomon da Costa.
The best antiquarian collections were those given to Oxford by Dr.
Rawlinson in the last century, by Richard Gough in 1809, and by Mr. Douce
in 1834. Mr. Macray has enumerated nearly thirty libraries which Richard
Rawlinson had laid under contribution, and his list includes such
headings as the Miscellaneous Papers of Samuel Pepys, the Thurloe State
Papers, the remains of Thomas Hearne, and documents belonging to Gale and
Michael Maittaire, Sir Joseph Jekyll, and Walter Clavell of the Temple.
He cites a letter written by Rawlinson in 1741, as showing the curious
accidents by which some of these documents were preserved: 'My agent last
week met with some papers of Archbishop Wake at a chandler's shop: this
is unpardonable in his executors, as all his MSS. were left to Christ
Church; but _quaere_ whether these did not fall into some servant's hands,
who was ordered to burn them, and Mr. Martin Folkes ought to have seen
that done.'
Mr. Gough's collection related chiefly to English topography, Anglo-Saxon
and Northern literature, and printed service-books; it is stated to
contain more than 3700 volumes, all given by a generous bequest to form
'an Antiquary's Closet.' Mr. Douce's large library contained a number of
Missals and _Livres d'Heures_. Some of these are described as 'priceless
gems rivalled only by the Bedford Missal,' especially one prayer-book
illuminated for Leonora, Duchess of Urbino, another that belonged to
Marie de Medici, and 'a Psalter on purple vellum, probably of the ninth
century, which came from the old Royal Library of France.
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