Descriptio Britanniæ Insulæ.
Expositio super Merlinum, imperfecta."
It may perhaps be supposed that this proves too much, as, besides the direct title of the volume, eight "tracts" are here entered, while in the Power of Attorney only two are noticed. But we would maintain, nevertheless, that it is the identical book, and explain this variation in the description by the circumstance that the library having, in the space of nearly two centuries, been materially enriched, numerous works, consisting in many cases only of a single "quaternion," were inserted in the volumes already existing. An examination of the structure of books of this period would confirm this view, and show that their apparent clumsiness is to be explained by the facility it was then the custom to afford for the interpolation or extraction of "sheets," by a contrivance somewhat resembling that of the present day for temporarily fixing loose papers in a cover, and known as the "patent leaf-holder."
The second document is a list of certain books, belonging to the monastery of Anglesey, early in the fourteenth century, allotted out to the canons of the house for the purpose of custody, or, perhaps, of study or devotion.
"Isti libri liberati sunt canonicis die ... anno regni Regis Edwardi septimo"[3] (7 Edw. II. A.D. 1314.)
Penes Dominum Priorem; Parabelæ Salomonis; Psalterium cum ...
Penes Dominum J. de Bodek.; Epistolæ Pauli...; Quædam notulæ super psalter et liber miraculorum ... Mariæ cum miraculis sanctorum.
Penes Sub-priorem; Liber vitæ Sancti Thomæ Martiris.
Penes E. de Ely; Quartus liber sententiarum cum sermo...; Liber Reymundi; Liber de vitiis et virtutibus et pastorale.
Penes R. Pichard; Liber Alquini; Liber Johannis de Tyrington cum Catone et aliis.