At the end of the Readers' Register for 1647-8, 1648-9, is a list of
nine volumes 'olim surrepti,' of which five had been replaced by other
copies. Entries are made in the same place of some coins which were
given in 1648-50. At this period the Library appears to have been well
attended by readers; about twelve or fifteen quarto and octavo volumes
being daily entered, those of folio size being accessible (as, in regard
to a portion of the Library, is still the case) by the readers
themselves, and not registered because at that time chained to their
shelves. The register for the next years (as well as those which
followed, up to the year 1708) appears to be lost, so that it cannot be
ascertained whether this daily average continued during the Usurpation;
but thus far it seems that Dr. John Allibond's description of the state
of the Library as consequent on the Puritan visitation of the University
in 1648, is not borne out by facts. For that loyal humourist, in his
_Rustica Academiæ Oxoniensis nuper reformatæ Descriptio_, which is
supposed to commemorate the condition of Oxford in Oct. 1648, writes
thus of our Library:--
'Conscendo orbis illud decus
Bodleio fundatore:
Sed intus erat nullum pecus,
Excepto janitore.
Neglectos vidi libros multos,
Quod mimime mirandum:
Nam inter bardos tot et stultos
There's few could understand 'em.'