By the Rev. J. E. Jackson. 77 



for Wilts;" the second in 1838, with the title of "An Essay 

 towards the Description, &c." (as above). 



On the Title page of the Vol. A, Aubrey has written, " Let these 

 ttoo volumes of Antiquities of Wilts be Dedicated to my singular 

 good Lord the Rt. Honble. James Earle of Abingdon." The first 

 page of the "Work is headed " Vol. A. Part I." Half-way through 

 the Vol. begins " Part II." 



It has always been supposed in our time, both at the Ashmolean 

 Library, and by every one else, myself included, that these two 

 Parts were in fact the two Volumes spoken of by Aubrey ; only 

 that they happened to have been bound up together. The late 

 Mr. John Britton, who wrote a full and particular Memoir of 

 Aubrey and his works (published in 4to. by the Wilts Topogra- 

 phical Society, 1845), describing the manuscript in the Ashmolean 

 Library, says (p. 85) : " It consists of two Volumes folio, bound in 

 vellum." Having in the mean time made a discovery upon this 

 subject, I one day asked Mr. Britton why he said they were two 

 Volumes, when there was only one in the library at Oxford ? His 

 answer was : " They are both in one." I then stated to him my 

 reasons for believing that we were all under a mistake, that besides 

 the one (in two Parts) now in the Library, and marked A., Aubrey 

 had most undoubtedly compiled another entire and distinct Volume 

 marked B., which is lost. 



This I now prove by producing, 1st, from Aubrey's own letters 

 preserved in the same library ; 2ndly, from marginal notes in the 

 Second Part of Vol. A. ; and then, from some other sources, several 

 references to another Volume marked B. 



1. From his own letters : 



^ "I hope my Brother hath sent you my Book B." (To 



A. Wood, Sep. 2 1671). 

 % " Ferriby's Pastorals, which I have to insert in lAber 



B." (Ditto 1671). 

 i[ " Ramsbury is in Liber. B." (To Anthony Wood, 17 



November, 1670). 

 ^ "Bradenstoke. Yi^e Lib. B . 61." (To do. Sept. 2, 1671). 



