Let me now turn to England, and treat in greater detail of the monastic
and cathedral libraries there, and what happened to them. The
Dissolution, as we know, occurred here near on 400 years ago, which
makes the task of tracing the books at once harder and more fascinating
than in the case of France or Germany, where a whole library may be
found practically intact in a town near its old home. Of course, what
was done there ought to have been done here. Leland, the King's
antiquary, the abusive Protestant, John Bale, and the foolish but
learned Dr. John Dee, begged that it might be done. Yet, whatever Henry
VIII's or Mary's or Elizabeth's intentions may have been at times as to
the foundation of a "solempne library" where the ancient books of the
realm might be stored, they got but a very little way. Leland did secure
some MSS. for the Royal Library, perhaps most from Rochester, but upon
the whole the work was left in Elizabeth's days to individual
enthusiasts--Sir Robert Cotton, Archbishop Parker, and Dee and Bale
themselves. Others who did good work were Henry Fitzalan, Earl of
Arundel; Lord William Howard; Long Harry Savile of Bank; Laurence
Nowell, who rescued Anglo-Saxon books; Nicholas Brigam, who was
interested in English literature and built Chaucer's tomb in the Abbey;
the Theyers of Brockworth, near Gloucester. These are names to some of
which we shall return; it would be well at this moment to take a few
libraries one by one and see what can be said of them.