My thanks are due also to Dr Butler, the Master of Trinity, Cambridge, for his kindness in telling me what little there is to tell of Wilkins' short tenure of the Mastership.

The Bishop of Chester, Dr Jayne, formerly a Scholar of Wadham, now Bishop of the Diocese which Wilkins held, has helped me with information about the short episcopate of his predecessor. For it I am grateful to him, as well for the suggestion or command which led to my first attempt, made four years ago, to write something about Wilkins.

The too short article in the 'Dictionary of National Biography' has been of much service: it gives the bibliography of the subject, or an equivalent, for no life of Wilkins has been written till now, and indicates the sources of information about him: it also puts in clear order the events of his varied life. Mr Sanders must know much which he should be gently forced to tell.

Fain would I acknowledge to Wood and Aubrey the debt I owe to them, especially to Wood, and ask his pardon for occasional ill-natured remarks about him, as ill-natured nearly as his own about most of his contemporaries.

The only merit claimed for this libellus is its brevity—no small recommendation in this age of "exhaustive treatment" when, in bibliography especially, it is difficult to see the wood for the trees. It is an inadequate expression of the writer's affection for the College in which he has spent more than forty years of his life, and the unvarying kindness and indulgence which he has received from pupils and colleagues.

CONTENTS.