ibertes anglaises_ in the _Collection de Textes pour l'Etude et
l'Enseignement de l'Histoire_. Equally useful is COSNEAU'S _Grands
Traites de la Guerre de Cent Ans_ also in the same _Collection de
Textes_. The _Statutes of the Realm_ (vol. i., fol., 1810) contains the
text of the laws and of the great charters of this period.

Chronicles, with all their deficiencies, must ever be largely used as
sources of continuous historical narrative. For the thirteenth century
our chief reliance must still be placed upon the annals drawn up in
various monasteries, some based upon little more than gossip or
hearsay, others showing real efforts to acquire authentic information.
The greatest centre of historical composition in thirteenth-century
England was the Abbey of St. Alban's, whose chronicles form so
important a series that they may appropriately be considered as a
whole, before the other chroniclers are dealt with in approximately
chronological order. The fame of St. Alban's as a school of history had
its origin in the order of Abbot Simon (d. 1183) that the house should
always appoint a special historiographer. The first of these whose work
is now extant is ROGER OF WENDOVER (d. 1236), whose _Flores
Historiarum_ (ed. H.O. Coxe, Engl. Hist. Soc., 1842, or ed. Hewlett,
Rolls Series, 1886-89--this latter edition is unscholarly) becomes
original in 1216 and remains a chief source, copious and interesting,
if not always precise, until 1235. On Wendover's death, MATTHEW PARIS,
who took the monastic habit in 1217, became the official St. Alban's
chronicler. His great work, the _Chronica Majora_, is, up to 1235,
little more than an expansion and embellishment of Wendover. He
re-edited Wendover's work with a patriotic and anti-curialist bias
quite alien to the spirit of the earlier writer, whose version should
preferably be followed. Paris's book is a first-hand source from 1235
to 1259. The narrative of the years 1254-1259 is considerably later in
composition to the history of the period 1235-1253, since on reaching
1253 Paris devoted himself to an abridgment of what he had already
written, called the _Historia Minor_. On completing this he resumed his
earlier book, and carried it on to the eve of his death in 1259, though
he did not live to complete its final revision; that was the work of
another monk who added a picture of his death-bed. The _Chronica
Majora_ has been excellently edited by Dr. H.R. Luard in seven volumes
for the R