[Footnote 1: A valued Correspondent, who has strongly urged the adoption of the course which we are now recommending to our Readers, thus illustrates his position:--
"It seems to be a very good thing to have a medium of genealogical inquiry; but why should all the world be troubled with the answers to a man who writes,--
'Sir,--I shall be obliged to anybody who can give me a full account of my family.
"Again, supposing X. Y. wants to borrow some not very common book which one happens to have, I am not going to write (and if I did so write you would not print it), 'If X. Y., as soon as he sees this, will call on the Pump at Aldgate, he will find my copy of the book tied to the spout, if the charity boys have not cribbed it; and he can return it or not, according to his conscience, if he has any."]
PROCLAMATIONS OF THE SOCIETY OF ANTIQUARIES, AND THEIR VALUE AS HISTORICAL EVIDENCES.
The work that is now going on at the Society of Antiquaries in reference to the collection of royal proclamations in their library, is one in which not merely the Fellows of that Society, but all historical students, are deeply interested. The Society possesses one of the three known largest collections of these public documents. They were formerly bound up in volumes of several different sizes, intermixed with a variety of fugitive publications, such as ballads and broadsides, which formed altogether a very incongruous collection. A short time since it was found that the binding of many of the volumes was very much worn, and that some of the documents themselves had been considerably torn and damaged. Under these circumstances, Mr. Lemon, of the State Paper Office, offered his services to the Council to superintend an entire new arrangement, mounting, binding, and calendaring, of the whole series of proclamations. His offer was of course gratefully accepted, and the work is now in active progress.
The collection is certainly the most important that is known, and is especially so in the reign of Elizabeth; in reference to which there is no collection at all approaching to it, either in completeness or value. Still there are many proclamations wanting: several of the Fellows of the Society have come forward most liberally to fill up gaps. MR. PAYNE COLLIER led the way in a contribution of great value; MR. SALT followed MR. COLLIER with a munificent donation of a whole collection relating to Charles II. and James II.; and upon Mr. Lemon's suggestion, and with the joint concurrence of Mr. Secretary Walpole and the Keeper of the State Paper Office, an interchange of duplicates has been effected between that office and the Society of Antiquaries, which has added forty proclamations to the Society's collection.