HISTORIC M.S.S.

Gisborne Times, Volume LXVIII, Issue 10739, 9 November 1928, Page 5

HISTORIC M.S.S.

neglected, documents in a. CATHEDRAL. The finding in the Exeter Cathedral library of the original draft from which the last will of King Henry VIII. was drawn up has called attention to thja fact that, there remains in the cathedral a mass or documents' that may contain other gems of historic- interest. The cathedral’s literary possessions, though housed: in a dry and almost fireproof building, have been neglected, and are largely .an undigested mass! of unknown value, representing the accumulation of centuries. There are no funds to meet the "heavy cost of the thorough search and cataloguing that are urgently called l for. . • The King’s will, although magnicently bound, bears evidence that its parchments were once tightly folded into small, compafsjs, and as that most probably happened before Queen Elizabeth parted with it in 1590, it seems not unlikely that the creasing was the result of the Queen carrying the document about with her ‘during thef years' when nhe . will was in dispute.