comprehend, and which they doubtless parted with for a small pittance.

There is in the collection a Life of Francis Borgia, one of the early Generals of the Jesuit order, cousin to the notorious Cæsar Borgia, by Ribadeneira, published at Rome, in 1596. This work is not only a rare book, but one of great interest. The subject of the memoir was a distinguished Spanish nobleman, of exalted talents and exemplary character. The duties of his station made it incumbent upon him to attend the remains of the deceased queen while exposed in state; in the fulfilment of which duty he became so deeply impressed by the distorted features of the deceased that he resolved to relinquish the gay court and its festivities, and devote himself entirely to religious contemplation, under the garb of an ecclesiastic. In this capacity his life was so exemplary as to furnish an exalted model for the admiration and imitation of other religious.

Also, an excellent life of Cardinal Bellarmine, by Fuligatti, published in 1625; a History of the India Missions, by Grinchovius; a copy of the canons of the Society of Jesus; a Defence of the Jesuit Missions in China, from the library of the Earl of Guilford, Governor of the Ionian Islands; and Maimbourg's History of Calvinism, published in 1682, from the collection of the late Dr. Jarvis, which had

a distinguished reputation for rare ecclesiastical works, and was finally disposed of at auction for a considerable price.

The library contains the works of St. Chrysostom, St. Thomas Aquinas, St. Anselm, St. Cyril, St. Bernard, St. Irenæus, St. Tertullian, St. Cyprian, St. Athanasius, and others.

There is likewise a respectable collection of religious poetry; a curious collection of works on emblems; a rare one on proverbs, including those of the Dutch, German, Spanish, French, some Asiatic and African; and many valuable works on Welsh history and antiquities.

Among the rarities of the Library is a History of Utrecht, Historia Ultrajectina, by Beka and Heda, published in that city in 1643. It was in the library of Cardinal Marefuschi, who bought it, as seems from a note apparently in his handwriting, at the sale of the library of Cardinal Ottoboni, and which same note goes on to state that it had before that time been in the library of Christina, Queen of Sweden, who, on renouncing Protestantism, settled in Rome. It has very numerous manuscript annotations, which this same entry (probably of Cardinal Marefuschi, whose book-plate it also has) declares to be by the great Hugo Grotius. One of the manuscript annotations states that the writer of them

read Beka and Heda's work at Paris in 1644. Now Grotius was the Ambassador of Christina in that city at that time.

Other volumes of interest are a folio MS., containing the Latin Gospels of Matthew and Mark, with a Commentary, probably of the fourteenth century; and another folio one of the specimens of early printing; St. Augustine's De Civitate Dei, with the old Commentaries of Valois and Trivet, printed about 1470; a copy of Bishop Fell's Life of Hammond, that had belonged to Charles Wesley whilst a student, and whose autograph it contains; a copy of Sherlock on Providence, that had once been owned by the eminent merchant John Thornton, and passed from him to William Wilberforce; and another book with the autograph of Doddridge.

The strength of the collection is in its Jansenist works, but it has besides an excellent collection of Puritan authors, and works on the Mennonite, the Anabaptist, and the modern Baptist history. As a whole, it is supplied with more ample materials for writing a history of the Baptist church from its origin to the present time, than any other collection, either public or private, in the United States. Many of its most valuable works have evidently been collected with that view, but whether its possessor, whose ability for such a work is universally

recognized, will ever commence its preparation, it is impossible to determine. Should he fail to do so, it is to be hoped that this numerous religious sect will not permit a library, in whose preservation they possess so deep an interest, to be dispersed, and thus placed beyond the reach of some future historian, who with less arduous pastoral duties, and a greater share of physical health, and perhaps of ambition, than Dr. Williams, may be willing to devote the best years of his life to such a praiseworthy task.

MISCELLANEOUS COLLECTIONS.

In addition to the libraries embraced in the preceding pages, there are a large number of very excellent collections, varying in extent from one to several thousand volumes, some of which are devoted to specialties, and many are just objects of pride as well as sources of pleasure to their possessors.

Among these may be mentioned that of William B. Astor, which numbers five thousand volumes, and contains most of the standard works which a well-informed gentleman requires for ordinary consultation. The munificent donation of this gentleman to the splendid foundation made by his father, of the Astor library, will, in time, render this public library the most extensive, as well as the most useful, in America.

The library of J. W. Ashmead, which likewise contains about five thousand volumes, is chiefly devoted to Jurisprudence, in which department it possesses a valuable series of works, selected with great care during a long and somewhat arduous professional career.