A vellum MS. has lately come into my possession, containing the Service for the Dead, Prayers, &c., with the tones for chanting, &c., in Latin, written for a German Order, apparently about the year 1430.
This tome, which is in small 4to., is very remarkable and valuable on account of the binding. This is red leather, stamped with double lines forming lozenges, and powdered with additional stamps, Or, a lion, a fleur-de-lys, an eagle, and a star. The whole is on the plain leather, without any gilding.
But in addition hereto, a full inscription runs along each back, at top and bottom and each side, stamped with _movable metal types_ applied by hand, { 406} without gold, as is done by the bookbinder to this day in blind stamping.
The legend on the first back is as follows:
_At top._--"DIEZ . PUCHLE[=I] _Continued to the right._--IST . S. . MARGRETEN . _At the bottom._--SCHUEST . AB[=T] . ZU . _Continued to the left._--S. . KATHERE[=I] . ZU . MUR."
"Diez puchlein ist schwester Margreten, sehuest abtisse zu Sankt Katherein zu Mur."
_At top._--"NACH . CRIST . _Continued to the right._--GEPURT . MCCCCXXXV . _At bottom._--UVART . GEPUN _Continued to the left._--D[=E] . DIEZ . PUCH ... K."
"Nach Crist gepurt MCCCCXXXV uvart gepunden diez puch ... k."
The whole inscription will therefore be, in English,--
THIS BOOKLET IS SISTER MARGARET'S, SISTER-ABBESS AT SAINT CATHERINE'S AT MUR.
AFTER CHRIST'S BIRTH, 1435, WAS BOUN- DEN THIS BOOK ... K.
A letter or two is illegible, from the injury made by the clasp, before the last K. Both the clasps are torn away, perhaps from their having been of some precious metal. Has this K anything to do with Köster?
Can any particulars be given of the abbess, monastery, and town mentioned?
Is any other specimen of movable _metal_ types known of so early a date?
Among the pictures at Brickwall House, Northiam, Sussex, are the following portraits by artists whose names are not mentioned either in Bryan, or Pilkington, or Horace Walpole's notices of painters. I shall be thankful for any information respecting them.
1. A full-length portrait in oils (small size) on canvas (29 inches by 24) of a gentleman seated, dressed in a handsome loose gown, red slippers, and on his head a handsome, but very peculiar velvet cap; on the ground, near him, a squirrel; and on a table by his side, a ground plan of some fortification. "John Sommer _pinxit_, 1700."