STRAUS, R. and DENT, R. K. John Baskerville. London, 1907. WILLIS, R. and CLARK, J. W. Architectural History of the University of Cambridge. 4 vols. Cambridge, 1886. WORDSWORTH, C. The Correspondence of Richard Bentley. 2 vols. London, 1842. Scholae Academicae. Cambridge, 1877. I JOHN SIBERCH Excursions into the realm of legend have long served as the traditional method of approach of the academic historian to his subject. True, the story of the foundation of the university of Cambridge by "one Cantaber, a Spaniard, about 370 years before Christ," or, as Fisher described him in 1506, "Cantaber, a king of the East Saxons, who had been educated at Athens," is now definitely rejected as unhistorical; but it was only in 1914 that the name of Sigebert, King of the East Angles, was removed from the list of royal benefactors[1]. University printing, like the university itself, has its Apocrypha. Edmund Carter, writing in 1753, includes a short section on _University Printers_: Printing had not been long used in _England_ before it was brought hither, but by whom it is difficult to ascertain, tho' it may be supposed that _Caxton_, (who is said to be the first that brought this curious art into _England_, and was a _Cambridgeshire_ Man, born at _Caxton_ in that County, from which he takes his Name) might Erect a Press at _Cambridge_, as well as at _Westminster_, under the care of one of his Servants; (for it is Conjectured, he brought several from _Germany_ with him). The first Book we find an Account of, that was Printed here, is a Piece of _Rhetoric_, by one _Gull. de Saona_, a Minorite; Printed at _Cambridge_ 1478; given by Archbp. Parker to _Bennet_ College Library. It is in Folio, the Pages not Numbered, and without ketch Word, or Signatures. Alas for Carter's pious suppositions! Caxton, according to his own testimony, was born in Kent and Cambridge can claim only to be the place of compilation of the _Rhetorica_; the phrase at the end of the book, _Compilata in Universitate Cantabrigiae_, no doubt led to the entry being made in the catalogue in the form _Rhetorica nova, impressa Cantab, fo._ 1478, and the mistake persisted for two centuries. Nor is Oxford without a controversial prologue to the story of its printing. In the first Oxford book the date appears in the colophon as MCCCCLXVIII and for long it was sought to establish the claim that Oxford printing preceded Caxton. But though it has been contended that the ground for the claim "has not yet entirely slipped away," it is now generally accepted by bibliographers that the printer omitted an X from the date, which should in fact be MCCCCLXXVIII. "The oldest of all inter-university sports," said Maitland, "was a lying match." * * * * *