After such an opinion, confirmatory of my own strong doubts, I could not think of using these documents in the text, but, as curiosities, I have transferred them to this Appendix.
No. II.—Vol. I., p. 244.
The following important Memorandum from W. J. Thoms, Esq., House of Lords, on the MS. Prayer Book attached to the Act of Uniformity, 1662, occurs in the Appendix to the Minutes of Evidence taken before the Royal Commission on Ritual:—
“In the course of a conversation with the Dean of Westminster on Tuesday week (30th July), after calling my attention to a pamphlet of Mr. Hull on the subject of the supposed loss of the Book of Common Prayer attached to the Act of Uniformity, the Dean expressed a wish to see the tower (formerly a portion of the Abbey) in which the original Acts of Parliament were till lately kept, the rooms in the Victoria Tower where the Acts are now deposited, and the Act of Uniformity itself. I promised to make the necessary arrangements for his doing so, on the following Thursday (1st August).
“My attention having been called by the Dean to the Prayer Book before alluded to, when settling with the person who arranges the Acts in the Victoria Tower to be in the way at the time the Dean had appointed to come, I spoke to him about the book; and he then told me, that when the Acts were removed, he had found, among other books, MS. Journals, &c., a Manuscript Prayer Book, which he had handed over to the Chief Clerk, Mr. Smith. I at once felt satisfied that that was the book respecting which there seems to have been so much mistaken anxiety; but the accidental absence of Mr. Smith prevented my then examining the book; and until I had seen it, and positively ascertained the fact, I thought it better, in case I should prove mistaken, not to mention to the Dean that the book was in Mr. Smith’s custody.
“Mr. Smith, who came to me in the Library a few minutes after the Dean had left, at once said the Prayer Book was in his custody, showed it to me, and I communicated the fact on the same evening to the Dean.
“William J. Thoms.
“Library, House of Lords,
“8th August, 1867.”
“An inspection of this MS. Prayer Book has proved to the Commissioners that the ‘Order for Morning and Evening Prayer daily to be said and used throughout the year,’ is identical in all respects with that which is ordinarily prefixed to the Book of Common Prayer.”
It would be beyond my purpose to attempt a description of these books—indeed no full and correct idea of their appearance and contents could be supplied except by a fac-simile reprint of them, which I hope will be some day published—but in the meanwhile I will present the reader with a transcript of the list of alterations inserted at the beginning of the MS. volume. This copy was carefully compared with the original by Mr. Thoms and myself.