had called it of old, but now destitute alike both of science and of seats. 'And thus,' says he himself, 'I concluded at the last to set up my staff at the Library-door in Oxon; being thoroughly persuaded that, in my solitude and surcease from the commonwealth-affairs, I could not busy myself to better purpose than by reducing that place (which then in every part lay ruined and waste) to the publick use of students[17].' So therefore, on Feb. 23, 1597-8, he wrote a letter to the Vice-Chancellor, offering that whereas 'there hath bin heretofore a publike library in Oxford, which, you know, is apparant by the roome itself remayning, and by your statute records, I will take the charge and cost upon me, to reduce it again to his former use,' first by fitting it up with shelves and seats, next by procuring benefactions of books, and lastly by endowing it with an annual rent[18]. This offer being accepted with great gratitude, other letters followed from him in March, in which he desired that delegates should be chosen to consider the best mode of fitting up the room, and mentioned an offer on the part of his own College, Merton, to provide timber for the purpose. Two years were spent in the carrying out of this work and in the preliminary arrangements. Amongst these preparations was the putting up the beautiful roof which to this day is such an object of deserved admiration. It is divided into square compartments, on each of which are painted the arms of the University, being the open Bible, with seven seals[19], between three ducal crowns, on the open pages of which are the words (so truly fitting for a Christian School) 'DOMINUS Illuminatio mea[20];' while on bosses that intervene between each compartment are painted the arms of Bodley himself, being five martlets with a crescent for difference, quartered with the arms of Hone (his mother's family), two bars wavy between three billets; on a chief the three ducal crowns of the University shield, 'quarum merito gloriam ab Academia derivavit.' (Wake, _Rex Platon_. p. 12.) The striking motto 'Quarta perennis erit' was assigned to Bodley at the same time with this academic augmentation[21]. When, in 1610, the eastern wing of the Library was erected, a similar roof was added, as was also done to the Picture Gallery (built between 1613-1619); in the latter room the roof, having become decayed and out of repair, was unhappily altogether removed in the year 1831, and a plaster ceiling, divided into compartments, substituted. A few of the panels of this roof have been preserved, one bearing the figures of two cats, which used to be an object of interest to juvenile visitors, and a series bearing the letters which compose Sir Thomas Bodley's name, together with a portrait of him upon a centre panel. A high-backed arm-chair, the Librarian's seat of office in the Library, was formed out of oak from the roof, and an engraving hangs in the Gallery which represents the room before its change for the worse.