In 1828, the Maitland Club was founded in Glasgow, and it printed three old romances, viz.: 'Clariodus,' 'Sir Beves of Hamptoun,' and 'Lancelot du Lak.'
The Abbotsford Club commenced its career in 1835, at Edinburgh, and printed several romances from the Auchinleck MS., as 'Rouland,' and 'Vernagu,' and 'Otuel,' 'Arthour and Merlin,' 'Sir Guy of Warwick,' and 'Rembrun,' and 'Sire Degarre.'
The Spalding Club, which was founded in 1839, at Aberdeen, printed Barbour's 'Brus' in 1856.
Although the publications of these clubs are very praiseworthy, and have done much good, the number of copies is so small, and their commercial value so great, that they are placed almost as far beyond the reach of the ordinary literary man as the manuscripts themselves. We believe that all true lovers of their country's literature will echo the words of a living editor quoted in the first prospectus of the Early English Text Society. 'I should rejoice to see my books in the hands of a hundred, where they are now on the shelves of one.'
Soon after the select printing clubs were started, a more popular movement set in, with the foundation in 1834 at Durham of the excellent Surtees Society. Although its publications are mostly of an historical or local character, it has issued several literary relics, such as 'The Anglo-Saxon and Early English Psalter,' 'Latin Hymns of the Anglo-Saxon Church,' and 'The Lindisfarne and Rushworth Gospels.'
Four years afterwards, the Camden Society was started in London, and from 1838 to the present time it has continued to publish a most valuable collection of works. Its chief object has been to advance historical studies, but it has issued the 'Thornton Romances,' comprising the early English romances of Perceval, Isumbras, Eglamour, and Degravant; three early English metrical romances—viz., 'The Anturs (or Adventures) of Arther at the Tarnewathelan, Sir Amadace, the Avowynge of King Arther, Sir Gawan, Sir Kaye, and Sir Bawdewyn of Bretan;' 'The Ancren Riwle,' a treatise on the rules and duties of monastic life; an 'Apology for Lollard Doctrines' attributed to Wicliffe; and Mr. Way's invaluable edition of the old English and Latin Dictionary, entitled 'Promptorium Parvulorum.'
All students of English literature owe a debt of gratitude to the Percy Society, which was founded in 1840. Unfortunately it did not meet with the success that it deserved, and died a natural death after some unfortunate dissension among its editors. Nevertheless, it published in a convenient form, among other works, 'Selections from the Minor Poems of John Lydgate;' 'The Owl and the Nightingale' from a better MS. than that which the Roxburghe Club had printed; 'Reynard the Fox;' 'Poems of John Audelay;' 'Romance of Syr Tryamoure;' 'Chaucer's Canterbury Tales,' from the oldest and perhaps the best manuscript known; 'Songs and Carols of the fifteenth century;' and William de Shoreham's 'Religious Poems.'
In 1843, the Cheetham Society was formed at Manchester, in order to print the historical and literary remains connected with the palatine counties of Lancaster and Chester; and the Ælfric Society in London, for the publication of Anglo-Saxon works, both civil and ecclesiastical.
The Caxton Society was started in 1845, and the Warton Club in 1854.
The late Canon Shirley at one time projected a Wycliffe Society, which was to print our great reformer's works, but instead he induced the Oxford delegates to undertake the task, and after great labour he published, in 1865, his catalogue of Wycliffe's works. His lamented death has not stopped the undertaking, and one volume of the Latin works has been published at Oxford, and three of the English ones are nearly ready for issue.