ereof": Petition (to Q. Elizabeth) for an
academy of Antiquities and History. _Hearne's Curious
Discourses written by eminent Antiquaries_; vol. ii., 326,
edit. 1775.]

Of the bibliomaniacal propensity of Edward's grandson, the great
EDWARD THE THIRD, there can be no question. Indeed, I could gossip
away upon the same 'till midnight. His severe disappointment upon
having Froissart's presentation copy of his Chronicles[261]
(gergeously [Transcriber's Note: gorgeously] attired as it must have
been) taken from him by the Duke of Anjou, is alone a sufficient
demonstration of his love of books; while his patronage of Chaucer
shews that he had accurate notions of intellectual excellence.
Printing had not yet begun to give any hint, however faint, of its
wonderful powers; and scriveners or book-copiers were sufficiently
ignorant and careless.[262]

[Footnote 261: Whether this presentation copy ever came,
eventually, into the kingdom, is unknown. Mr. Johnes, who is
as intimate with Froissart as Gough was with Camden, is
unable to make up his mind upon the subject; but we may
suppose it was properly emblazoned, &c. The duke detained it
as being the property of an enemy to France!--Now, when we
read of this wonderfully chivalrous age, so glowingly
described by the great Gaston, Count de Foix, to Master
Froissart, upon their introduction to each other (vide St.
Palaye's memoir in the 10th vol. of _L'Acadamie des
Inscriptions_, &c.), it does seem a gross violation (at
least on the part of the Monsieur of France!) of all
gentlemanly and knight-like feeling, to seize upon a volume
of this nature, as legitimate plunder! The robber should
have had his skin tanned, after death, for a case to keep
the book in! Of Edward the Third's love of curiously bound
books, see p. 118, ante.]

[Footnote 262: "How ordinary a fault this was (of
'negligently or willfully altering copies') amongst the
transcribers of former times, may appear by Chaucer; who (I
am confident) tooke as greate care as any man to be served
with the best and heedfullest scribes, and yet we finde him
complayning against Adam, his scrivener, for the very same:

So ofte a daye I mote thy worke renew,
If to correct and eke to rubbe and scrape,
And all is thorow thy neglegence and rape."

Ashmole _Theat