Stokes — Concerning Manh's Library. 421 



■whicli was the " Comedies of Terence." From that press he continued 

 for forty years to pour forth numerous hooks of every sort and 

 condition, among which was the " Booke of Cookery" in 1500, and 

 the first edition of Henry the Eighth's work against Luther a 

 short time before he printed this Prayer Book under our notice. 

 Tou will observe, too, in the colophon of it, he calls himself the 

 king's printer, thus correcting a mistake made by ITr. Maskell, who 

 states that he was not appointed king's printer till the death of 

 Eastell, in 1536, the brother-in-law of the celebrated Sir Thomas 

 ^lore, who up to that time, held the post. This colophon shows 

 that Pynson was appointed some twelve years earlier at least.^ But 

 I have reserved to the last, the point for the sake of which I have 

 called the attention of this Academy to our Sarum Psalter. In 

 proceeding to examine this old book, I had a keen eye to the 

 advice of Mr. Bradshaw, about closely scrutinising the linings of 

 the binding, as in them IMr. Bradshaw made some of his own most 

 curious discoveries. The binders of the early days of the sixteenth 

 century had to get linings for their book covers, and as manuscripts 

 were then plentiful they often used up an old manuscript which, 

 then regarded as useless, is now of untold value and importance. 

 Well ! pasted inside the front cover I found a printed document which 

 I proceeded to examine and found to be an indulgence from Thomas 

 Wolsey and Laurence Campeggio, soKciting liberal alms for the comple- 

 tion of the north porch and chantry chapel of Hereford Cathedral.- 

 The document was evidently a pew bill which had been dispersed 

 through the church in modern fashion, which some pious Christian 

 had fastened, nearly four hundred years ago, inside his Prayer Book, 

 for future use, and there it lay till I found it on the 18th day of last 

 January. I shall now proceed to give a brief abstract of it, but inas- 

 much as the original owner of it seems to have used the book a 

 good deal, the document has been cracked and torn right through 

 from top to bottom, rendering the meaning at times very difficult 

 to make out. The document which is about 8 inches long by 5 

 inches broad, ^ proceeds thus — "Be it knowen to all cristen people 



1 Humphreys, in his " History of Printing," tells us that Pynson died in 1530. 

 Eastell may have been appointed on Pynson's death. 



- Hereford Cathedral has, in the past, owed a good deal to such documents. 

 The hull of John XXII. canonising Bishop Thomas Cantelupe seems to have touched 

 upon this topic ; cf. Dean Merewether's pamphlet on the condition of Hereford 

 Cathedral, a.d. 1841. 



2 A similar document of the same period was found by Mr. French in Trinity 



