in these, that several establishments were employed in the production of the manuscripts, and we may guess that there would probably be competition among them, which would naturally result in a settlement of some terms of payment.
In the early times it was only rich men who could afford to collect books. Amongst these, one of the most distinguished was Richard de Bury, Bishop of Durham, Treasurer and Chancellor of Edward III., who collected everything, and spared no cost in the maintenance of a staff of copyists and illuminators in his own household. Not only was he a collector (whose books, however, have been dispersed), but he was the author of an interesting relic of that devotion to an ennobling pursuit, the famous Philobiblon. This book had never been satisfactorily produced until the late Mr. Ernest Thomas issued in 1888 an admirable edition, founded on a collation of many manuscripts, and a spirited translation.1 This work occupied Mr. Thomas several years, and before he completed it he saw reason to doubt the high literary position which had been universally accorded to the author; and his opinion was confirmed by an unpublished passage in a manuscript of the Chronicon sui temporis of Adam de Murimuth, to which he was referred by Sir Edward Maunde Thompson, where Adam characterised the bishop in very harsh terms. Mr. Thomas published in “The Library” (vol. i. p. 335) an article entitled, “Was Richard de Bury an Impostor?” In this he expressed the opinion that Richard Aungerville—
(1) Was not an excellent bishop, but an ambitious self-seeker, who bought his way to preferment.
(2) Was not a scholar and patron of scholars, but merely a collector of books, that he might appear as a scholar.
(3) Did not bestow his collections on Durham College, Oxford, as he expressed his intention of doing; but that these collections were sold to pay debts incurred by his ostentatious extravagance.