3(ntrot)uction« 



EVERAL independent printing preffes were eftablifhed 

 in England before the clofe of the fifteenth century; 

 and from them iffued numerous books which are 

 invaluable to all ftudents of antiquity from the light 

 they throw upon the foclal habits and literary 

 progrefs of our nation. Of thefe it may fafely be faid that not one 

 exceeds in interefl that work of an unknown typographer, which is 

 here prefgnted in facfimile, and which, from the town in which it 

 was compiled, as well as printed, is known to all bibliographers as 

 "The Book of St. Albans." This work has always been a favourite, 

 partly becaufe our feelings are appealed to in favour of the writer 

 who for centuries has taken rank as England's earlieft poetefs, and 

 is ftill, in all our Biographical Di6lionaries, reckoned among "noble 

 authors;" and partly becaufe we love myfteries, and a myftery has 

 always enfhrouded the namelefs printer. The fubjedls, too, fo 

 curioufly alliterative — Hawking, Hunting, and Heraldry, have an 

 enticing and antique flavour about them, being juft thofe with 

 which, at that period, every man claiming to be "gentle" was 

 expe6led to be familiar ; while ignorance of their laws and language 

 was to confefs himfelf a "churl." 



