Through the kind and polite attention of Sir Henry Ellis, the principal librarian, I had every facility afforded me for examining the various printed and manuscript collections, and quite a number of transcripts were made of papers bearing upon our history. While speaking of this noble institution, I may be permitted to remark that nowhere else was I more strongly convinced of the indispensable necessity, to the investigator, of accurate catalogues, both for printed books and for manuscripts. There is now in course of preparation a systematic alphabetical catalogue of the printed works, of such comprehensiveness, that the letter "A" alone occupies about twenty large folio volumes. Notwithstanding the active and skilful exertions of

the learned and competent gentlemen who are engaged in this important work, it will be many years before it can be completed. The manuscripts are already catalogued and their examination thus rendered perfectly easy. The Harleian, the Lansdowne and the Cottonian collections, by means of their accurate catalogues, which were published some years ago by government, are almost as well known to literary men on this side of the ocean as to those in Europe ; and each addition to the manuscript department, as it is received, is at once catalogued and thus rendered accessible. " The Archiepiscopal library at Lambeth has also afforded us some interesting historical '

materials. My application to the Archbishop of Canterbury for permission to make researches in the library was promptly and cheerfully complied with ; and it gives me great satisfaction to have this opportunity of acknowledging the very marked liberality of the venerable prelate at the head of the English Church, as well as the urbanity and friendly interest displayed by His Grace's librarian, the Rev. S. R. Maitland, in making every arrangement for my convenient examination of the documents in his custody.