¹ The previous history of the manuscript has been involved, not only in complete doubt as to its whereabouts before 1814, but in uncertainty regarding some of the dates and conditions of transfer since that date. Incomplete histories of the manuscript are found in the EETS edition, pp. ix-xii, and in Chambers' Mediaeval Stage, II, 413. Adding those items which I have gleaned from various scattered sources, we have the following genealogy of possession:

(1) As part of the library of John Towneley (1731-1813) of Towneley Hall, near Burnley, Lancashire, it passed, through the sale by Evans of Pall Mall, London, on June 8, 1814, for £147 to

(2) John Louis Goldsmid, from whom it passed, presumably in the Evans sale of the Goldsmid library in December, 1815, to

(3) John North, from whom, through the Evans sale of North's library in May, 1819, it returned, for £94,10s. to

(4) The library of Towneley Hall. The MS was in this library in 1822 when the Judicium was edited by F. Douce for the Roxburghe Club. It was still in this library in 1836 when the editors of the Surtees Society edition thanked Peregrine Edward Towneley, Esq., for permission to transcribe the plays. (The inscription “P. E. Towneley 7 Park St Westminster” appears in pencil on the front fly-leaf verso of the manuscript.) I have been unable to find it listed among the “MSS in the library of Colonel Towneley at Towneley Hall” in the fourth report of the Historical MSS Commission published in 1874. However, it passed, through the second sale of the Towneley library, conducted by Sotheby, Wilkinson, and Hodge in June, 1883, for £620 to

(5) Mr. Bernard Quaritch, who still owned it when the EETS edition was published in 1897. He sold it in August, 1900, to

(6) Edward F. Coates, after whose death (August 14, 1921) it was sold, through Sotheby, Wilkinson, and Hodge, on February 8, 1922, to

(7) Mr. Henry E. Huntington, who transferred it to the United States and shortly after placed it in its present home.

For many of the above specific details not previously mentioned in histories of the manuscript, see B. Quaritch, Contributions Towards a Dictionary of English Book Collectors, 1892-99, and Wm. Y. Fletcher, English Book Collectors, 1902. For the ownership of the manuscript previous to 1814, see the latter part of the present article.

² It was through the courtesy of the late Mr. Chester M. Cate, Librarian of the Henry E. Huntington Library and Art Gallery, that I was privileged to make this examination. I am deeply indebted to Captain R. B. Haselden, in charge of the Manuscript Department, for his generous assistance in deciphering numerous scrawls, and in explaining several puzzling peculiarities in the state of the manucript, as well as to several British and American scholars, including Professors Charles Sisson, Karl Young, and Joseph Quincy Adams, for coöperation in various aspects of this investigation. Grateful acknowledgment is also due to the authorities of the Huntington Library for permission to reproduce two pages of the manuscript (folios 73b and 90a). Reproductions of two other pages of the manuscript will be found in the catalogue of the Sotheby, Wilkinson, and Hodge sale of Feb. 8, 1922 (folio 111b) and in the Surtees Society edition, p. xx (portion of folio 80a).

³ Previous descriptions of the binding (and manuscript) were made: (1) for the Sotheby sale of June 27, 28, 1883 (reading “olive morocco extra, gold tooling, tooled leather joints and gilt edges, by C. Lewis, back broken”); (2) by A. W. Pollard for the EETS edition, 1897 (merely quoting the Sotheby sale description); (3) for the Sotheby sale of Feb. 8, 1922 (reading “olive Morocco gilt, inside gilt borders, plain blue end-papers, in a red pull-off case”). None of these descriptions mentions the label on the back or the peculiarity of the separate pieces of leather pasted on the front and back covers. The back it not now broken. There is no specific description in the Surtees Society edition. I have not had access to the sales catalogues published for the three sales of the manuscript previous to the publication of the Surtees Society edition (i.e., the Evans sals of 1814, 1815, and 1819.—See note 1, above). All three of the catalogues in question are listed in the printed catalogue of catalogues in the British Museum.

⁴ An examination of the Towneley MSS in the British Museum kindly made on my behalf by Mr. Eric G. Millar at the instance of Dr. Montague Rhodes James has revealed four MSS (Add. MSS 32101 and 32104-6) bearing press marks similar to the one described above. The last three MSS are transcripts by Christopher Towneley. All four were acquired at the Towneley sale of 1883, the sale which disposed of the cycle of plays to Mr. Quaritch.

⁵ Moreover, folios 5a, 5b, 6a, and 6b all begin with the word “Bot”

⁶ Cf. the accompanying plate of fol. 73b with the reproduction of fol. 80a in the Surtees Society edition.

⁷ The three errors made by the scribe (the confusion of the text on folios 5b and 6a; the misplacement of the initial “D” on folio 80a which necessitated the making of a new initial; and the false start on folio 121a) might easily be accounted for by the fact that they are all connected with the beginnings of “gatherings” (signatures C1, M1, and S1) and that the time elapsing between periods of work on successive gatherings or the mere interruption of attention caused by making up a new gathering made for incoherence in the scribe's application to his task.

⁸ I have discovered, among a very large number of individuals of the Hargraves or Blackboum families, the following persons bearing the names of James Blackbourn or Thomas Hargraves:

(1) Thomas Hargraves, buried 8 Jan. 1566 at Burnley (Lancashire) parish church (Burnely Parish Register Rochdale, 1899).

(2) Thomas Hargreaves, referred to under several entries in The Registers of the Parish Church of Blackburn in the County of Lancaster, 1600-1660, Cambridge, 1911.

(3) James Blackburne, of Richmond, Yorkshire, baptised 2 Feb., 1644-45 (Rev. F. J. Poynton, Genealogical Memoranda relating to the family of Blackburne, etc., London, 1874. This same volume cites the mention of the same “James Blackbume” in the will of his brother, John Blackburne, who died in 1661)

(4) James Blackburne, of Hale (Lancashire), son of John Blackburne (died 1786, aged 93) and Catherine Ashton (died 1740). See Joseph Foster, Lancashire Pedigrees. London, 1873.

(5) Thomas Hargreaves, of Oak Hill, near Blackburn, Lancashire (1771-1822), See Burke's Dictionary of the Landed Gentry of Great Britain and Ireland, 1846.

(6) Thomas Hargreaves, died 24 July, 1737, aged 32 (inscription in churchyard of Lancashire parish church, Chetham Society Publications, new series. 59, page 753).

(7) Thomas Hargreaves, named as “churchwarden for Scotforth, Ashton, Stodday, and Thuroham” for the year 1845 (Chetham Society Publications, new series, 59, page 784).

I have found no mention of a James Blackbourn (or any similar spelling) in the Bumley Parish Registers, the parish registers of Blackburn, or in Beazleys Calendar of persons in Lancashire and Cheshire, The Record Society, 1922.

None of the facts about the above-listed persons seems to warrant any positive connection with the two men whose names appear on the manuscript. Nor do I know of any fact that would definitely establish the connection of any one of them with the Towneley family. Agnes de Towneley (grand-daughter of Peter de Tunlay or Towneley—13th cent.) married John de Hargreave and died without issue (Burke's History of the Commoners of Great Britain and Ireland, 1835). The members of the Towneley family most likely to have acquired the manuscript are: Sir John Towneley (1473-1539), who was educated at Whalley Abbey school, built a library at Towneley Hall, and saw the closing of the abbey and the execution of the abbot; his son, Richard Towneley (1499-1556), who was probably a Protestant; Christopher Towneley (1604-1674), who, according to Fletcher (op. cit. 231) “was the collector of many of the old manuscripts disposed of in the second sale of the Towneley library which occurred in 1883”; and John Towneley (1731-1813), who “as a book-purchaser .... was considered among the moat heavy-metalled and determined champions in the field” (Fletcher, op. cit. 226-231). The ascription by Mr. Oscar Cargill (“The Authorship of the Secunda Pastorum,” PMLAA, XLI, 810-831) of the authorship of Secunda Pastorum to Gilbert Pilkington has much to commend it to serious consideration. But hit suggestion (op. cit. 830) that the manuscript may have been acquired by Sir John Towneley from the related Pilkington family of Wakefield (between whom and Gilbert Pilkington he has, however, established no connection) savors too much of begging the question. In fact, there is fully as much reason in the suggestion of Mr. J. W. Walker (reported by Matthew H. Peacock, “The Wakefield Mysteries,” London Times Literary Supplement, March 5, 1925, page 156) that the Towneleys acquired it through their connections with the Nowell family of Wakefield. Three separate connections with the Nowell family were made by the marriages of Sir John Towneley's children.

⁹ It is noteworthy that the following “Johns” have some connection with the problem: Sir John Towneley (1473-1539), John Nowell (16th cent.), John Towneley (1731-1813), John Louis Goldsmid (early 19th cent.), and John North (early 19th cent.). I have discovered no “Samuel” in any of the families under consideration. “Allde” is a good old English family name, recalling the 16th century printers, John Allde and his son Edward Allde.

¹⁰ Play II, line 367.

¹¹ Play XIII, line 455.

¹² Play XIII, line 403.

¹³ Smith, L. T., York Plays, xxxviii.

¹⁴ E. E. T. S. edition, page x.

¹⁵ Peacock, Matthew H., “The Wakefield Mysteries,” London Times Literary Supplement, March 5, 1925, page 156. See also the reply of Russell Potter, ibid., April 30,1925, page 300.