MS 4A:1
A folio volume of state letters and poems, 65 pages. c.1625-30s.
Once belonging to the Sotheby family of London and Ecton Hall, Northamptonshire.
pp. 1, 6, 49
• BcF 643: Francis Bacon, Letter(s)
Copy of three letters by Bacon, to Robert Cecil, to the Earl of Essex, and to Queen Elizabeth.
p. 7
• EsR 35: Robert Devereux, second Earl of Essex, Verses made by the Earle of Essex in his Trouble (‘The waies on earth have paths and turnings knowne’)
Copy, ascribed to ‘My Lo: of Essex’.
May, Poems, p. 47. May, Courtier Poets, p. 254. EV 24641.
pp. 16-17
• BcF 197: Francis Bacon, A Direccon for the readeinge of histories with profitt made by Sr. ffrances Bacon
Copy, in a formal secretary hand, headed ‘A direccon for the readinge of historie with profitt made by Sr. ffrances Bacon’.
Edited from this MS, with facsimiles, in Bergeron.
‘Directions’ beginning ‘First you shall observe any law or custome wch shalbe worth the noteing...’. First published in David M. Bergeron, ‘Francis Bacon: An Unpublished Manuscript’, PBSA, 84 (1990).
p. 18
• RaW 988: Sir Walter Ralegh, Letter(s)
Copy of a letter by Ralegh, to Sir Robert Carr.
pp. 38-48
• SiP 207: Sir Philip Sidney, A Letter to Queen Elizabeth touching her Marriage with Monsieur
Copy, in a professional mixed hand, the order of some passages rearranged and the text occasionally abridged or slightly paraphrased, headed ‘Sr: P: Sidnes ltre to the Queene against the match with Mouncieur:’, the salutation (‘Most feared & beloved most sweet & gratious Queene’) isolated and set out into the margin, subscribed at the end ‘Sr: P: Sidney’, on eleven folio pages.
Beal, In Praise of Scribes, No. 28.
First published in Scrinia Caeciliana: Mysteries of State & Government (London, 1663) and in Cabala: sive Scrinia Sacra (London, 1663). Feuillerat, III, 51-60. Duncan-Jones & Van Dorsten, pp. 46-57.
This work and its textual transmission discussed, with facsimile examples, in Peter Beal, In Praise of Scribes: Manuscripts and their Makers in Seventeenth-Century England (Oxford, 1998), Chapter 4, pp. 109-46 (with most MSS catalogued as Nos 1-37, with comments on their textual tradition, in Appendix IV, pp. 274-80).
pp. 50-3
• BmF 46: Francis Beaumont, An Elegy on the Death of the Virtuous Lady, Elizabeth Countess of Rutland (‘I may forget to eat, to drink, to sleep’)
Copy, headed ‘An elegie upon the death of the faire and vertuous E. late Countesse of Rutland’, subscribed ‘Franc: Beamount’.
First published in Sir Thomas Overbury, A Wife, 11th impression (London, 1622). Dyce, XI, 507-11.
pp. 53-5
• BmF 93: Francis Beaumont, A Funeral Elegy on the Death of the Lady Penelope Clifton (‘Since thou art dead, Clifton, the world may see’)
Copy, headed ‘An Elegie’.
First published in Poems (London, 1653). Dyce, XI, 511-13.
pp. 56-7
• BmF 20: Francis Beaumont, Ad Comitissam Rutlandiae (‘Madam, so may my verses pleasing be’)
Copy, untitled.
First published, as ‘An Elegie by F. B.’, in Certain Elegies, Done by Sundrie Excellent Wits (London, 1618). Dyce XI, 505-7.
MS 153:10
A volume of transcripts of 15th-17th-century letters. 1806.
Owned and possibly compiled by the novelist Jan Porter (1776-1850). Later in the library of Sir Thomas Phillipps, Bt (1792-1872), book and manuscript collector: Phillipps MS 16688. Sotheby's, 27 June 1977, lot 4935.
pp. [23-31]
• GrF 22.5: Fulke Greville, Letter to Grevill Varney on his Travels
Copy.
An epistolary essay beginning ‘My good Cousin, according to the request of your letter, dated the 19. of October, at Orleance...’, dated from Hackney, 20 November 1609. First published in Certaine Learned and Elegant Workes (London, 1633). Grosart, IV, 301-6. This essay perhaps originally written by Thomas Bodley and possibly also used by Francis Bacon and/or the Earl of Essex. Also perhaps sent by Greville to John Harris rather than Greville Varney: see Norman K. Farmer, Jr., ‘Fulke Greville's Letter to a Cousin in France and the Problem of Authorship in Cases of Formula Writing’, RQ, 22 (1969), 140-7.
pp. [32-40]
• RaW 989: Sir Walter Ralegh, Letter(s)
Copy of a letter by Ralegh, to Prince Henry, undated.
MS Crawford 177
Autograph letter signed by Wroth, to Sir Robert Sidney, from Loughton, 19 March 1613[/14. 1614.
*WrM 16: Lady Mary Wroth, Letter(s)
Edited, with facsimiles, in Margaret J. Arnold's articles ‘Editing a Recent Mary Wroth Letter’, in New Ways of Looking at Old Texts, III, ed. W. Speed Hill (Tempe, AZ, 2004). pp. 103-14, and ‘An Unpublished Letter of Mary Wroth’, ELR, 35/3 (Autumn 2005), 454-8.
MS D153
A composite volume of state tracts and papers.
Owned by Sir Richard Grosvenor (1585-1645); later by the Duke of Westminster, Eaton Hall, Cheshire, with his bookplate (inscribed ‘XXI No. 3’) and a label with No. ‘4’ on the spine. Sotheby's, 19 July 1966, lot 490, to Hofmann & Freeman. Acquired from them June 1977.
ff. 40r-81r
• RaW 728.275: Sir Walter Ralegh, Ralegh's Arraignment(s)
Copy of Ralegh's arraignment in 1603 (here dated 1605).
Accounts of the arraignments of Ralegh at Winchester Castle, 17 November 1603, and before the Privy Council on 22 October 1618. The arraignment of 1603 published in London, 1648. For documentary evidence about this arraignment, see Rosalind Davies, ‘“The Great Day of Mart”: Returning to Texts at the Trial of Sir Walter Ralegh in 1603’, Renaissance Forum, 4/1 (1999), 1-12.
leaves after ff. 40-81
• RaW 990: Sir Walter Ralegh, Letter(s)
Copy of letters by Ralegh after his condemnation in 1603.
MS E103
Volume of speeches and proceedings in the House of Commons in 1627-8. Mid-17th century.
f. 130r
• HlJ 27.5: Joseph Hall, Episcopal Admonition, Sent in a Letter to the House of Commons, April 28, 1628
Copy.
See HlJ 17-30.
MS E107
Petition to the Committee of the Eastern Association. Signed by ‘att lest a Hundred persons inhabitinge wthin the three Hundreds of Newport Pagnell in the Countie of Bucks’, arguing in favour of the disbanding of the garrison at Newport Pagnell. [1640s, before June 1647].
MS E205
Two folio composite volumes of state tracts and papers, in various hands and paper sizes, in 19th-century half-vellum marbled boards gilt.
Mostyn MS 177: from the library of the Mostyn family, of Mostyn Hall, Flintshire, and Gloddaeth, Denbighshire, whose notable book and manuscript collectors included Sir Thomas Mostyn (1651-1700?) and his grandson Sir Thomas Mostyn, fourth Baronet (1704-58).
Recorded in HMC, 4th Report (1874), Appendix, p. 355.
Vol. I, ff. 33r-43r
• FeO 98: Owen Felltham, A Brief Character of the Low-Countries
Copy.
This MS discussed in Van Strien.
First published as Three Monethes observation of the low Countries especially Holland by a traveller whose name I know not more then by the two letters of J:S: at the bottome of the letter. Egipt this 22th of Jannuary (London, 1648). Expanded text printed as A brief Character of the Low-Countries under the States. Being three weeks observation of the Vices and Vertues of the Inhabitants... (for Henry Seile: London, 1652).
Vol. I, ff. 44r-59r
• SiP 206: Sir Philip Sidney, A Letter to Queen Elizabeth touching her Marriage with Monsieur
Copy, in a cursive professional hand, the text set out with exceptional clarity, headed ‘A Letter written by Sr. Philip Sidney to Queen Elizabeth touching her Marriage with Monsr. Duke of Aniow’ and with the salutation (‘Most feared and beloved, Most sweet and gratious Soveraigne’) set out and centred, 31 folio pages.
Beal, In Praise of Scribes, No. 27.
First published in Scrinia Caeciliana: Mysteries of State & Government (London, 1663) and in Cabala: sive Scrinia Sacra (London, 1663). Feuillerat, III, 51-60. Duncan-Jones & Van Dorsten, pp. 46-57.
This work and its textual transmission discussed, with facsimile examples, in Peter Beal, In Praise of Scribes: Manuscripts and their Makers in Seventeenth-Century England (Oxford, 1998), Chapter 4, pp. 109-46 (with most MSS catalogued as Nos 1-37, with comments on their textual tradition, in Appendix IV, pp. 274-80).
Vol. I, ff. 59v-63r
• DnJ 4067: John Donne, An Essay of Valour
Copy, headed ‘Valour Anatomized in a ffancie By Sr Philip Sidney. An°. 1582’.
First published in Sir Thomas Overbury, A Wife, 11th impression (London, 1622). Cottoni Posthuma (London, 1651), as ‘Valour Anatomiz'd in a Fancie by Sir Philip Sidney’. Paradoxes, Problems, Essayes (London, 1652). The Prose Works of Sir Philip Sidney, ed. Albert Feuillerat, 4 vols (Cambridge, 1968), III, 308-10 (as Appendix). Hayward, pp. 417-20. Peters, pp. 62-7 (among ‘Dubia’). The authorship discussed in Dennis Flynn, ‘Three Unnoticed Companion Essays to Donne's “An Essay of Valour”’, BNYPL, 73 (1969), 424-39.
Vol. I, ff. 504r-11r
• CtR 372: Sir Robert Cotton, A Relation of the Proceedings against Ambassadors who have miscarried themselves, etc. ...[27 April 1624]
Copy.
Tract, addressed to George, Duke of Buckingham, beginning ‘In humble obedience to your Grace's Command, I am emboldned to present my poor advice...’. Cottoni posthuma (1651), pp. 1-9.
Vol. II, ff. 8r-12r
• RuB 37.5: Sir Benjamin Rudyerd, Speech in the House of Commons, c.22 March 1627/8
Copy.
Speech beginning ‘Of the mischiefs that have lately fallen upon us by the late distractions here is every man sensible...’.
Vol. II, in ff. 51-104
• RuB 119.5: Sir Benjamin Rudyerd, Speech in the House of Commons, 10 February 1628/9
Copy.
A speech beginning ‘There be diverse recantations, submissions and sentences remaining on record...’. Variant versions include one beginning ‘That there have been many publique censures and recantacions...’. See Commons Debates for 1629, ed. Wallace Notestein and Frances Helen Relf (Minneapolis, 1921), pp. 137, [274]-5.
Vol. II, ff. 450r-5r
• CtR 131: Sir Robert Cotton, A Briefe Discovrse concerning the Power of the Peeres and Commons of Parliament in point of Judicature
Copy, headed ‘A breife discourse proving that the house of Comons hath equall power wth the Peeres in point of Judicature’, as ‘Written by Sr Robert Cotton to Sr Edward Mountague Anno 1621’. c.1620s-30s.
Baker, No. 1095 (p. 266).
Tract, the full title sometimes given as A Brief discourse prouinge that the house of Comons hath Equall power with the Peeres in point of Judicature written by Sr Rob: Cotton to Sr Edward Mountague Ano Dni. 1621, beginning ‘Sir, To give you as short an accompt of your desire as I can...’. First published in London, 1640. Cottoni posthuma (1651), pp. [341]-351.
See also the Introduction.
MS P519
A folio volume of tracts.
Among papers of the North family, Earls of Guilford.
pp. 1-20
• RaW 560.5: Sir Walter Ralegh, Apology for his Voyage to Guiana
Copy, in two mixed hands, headed ‘Sr Walter Ralegh his Apologie’.
A tract beginning ‘If the ill success of this enterprise of mine had been without example...’. First published in Judicious and Select Essays and Observations (London, 1650). Works (1829), VIII, 477-507. Edited by V. T. Harlow in Ralegh's Last Voyage (London, 1932), pp. 316-34.