The Curators reported, at the end of the annual list, that considerable progress had been made towards the formation of a new general Catalogue. Further progress was reported in the following year; in which year also Dibdin[289] announced that the Catalogue would be finished, in four folio volumes, by Messrs. Bandinel and Cotton under the superintendence of Professor Gaisford[290]. He adds, 'The Prince Regent hath munificently given a considerable sum towards the completion of these glorious labours.' There is no record in the annual accounts of any such donation; but in 1823 and 1824 payments amounting to £420 were made to the Librarian, Sub-librarians, and Assistant, for their work on the new Catalogue[291], out of 'the Prince Regent's benefaction.' On the proposition of the Chancellor, Lord Grenville, in 1814, Mr. Vansittart, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, had expressed his willingness to apply to Parliament for a grant of £5000 for the purpose; probably this idea was abandoned for the more easily practicable one of a grant from the Privy Purse. Four Greek MSS. were presented in this year by Rev. ---- Hall, Chaplain at Leghorn[292]; a copy of Lucan's _Pharsalia_, with MSS. collations by Joseph Addison, by the Warden of Merton College; and a large collection of books in Oriental literature, printed in Bengal, by the East India Company. [287] Hooke in 1685 was one of the Chaplains attending Monmouth in his rebellion! _Lockhart Papers_, 1817, vol. i. p. 148. [288] _Gent. Magaz._ vol. lxxv. ii. 569. [289] _Bibliogr. Decam._ iii. 429. [290] Portions of the Letters A F and P which had been thus prepared were subsequently printed, but the whole work was then for some years suspended, and afterwards commenced _de novo_. And nearly thirty years elapsed before it was finally completed. [291] Previous grants amounting to £260, had been made in 1820. [292] Three of these are described in Mr. Coxe's Catalogue, cols. 812-14. A.D. 1817. The large Canonici collection of MSS. was obtained from Venice in this year, for the sum of £5444, a purchase unprecedented in greatness in the history of the Library[293]. The collection was formed by Matheo Luigi Canonici, a Venetian Jesuit, who was born in 1727 and died in Sept. 1805 or 1806. Indefatigable in his passion for antiquities, he first formed a Museum of statues and of medals at Parma, but, in consequence of the Jesuits being expelled from the State, this was sold to the government. He then at Bologna set himself to collect religious objects of interest, and had succeeded to some extent, when the rector of his society observed to him that such a collection was little suitable to a poor monk, and he consequently disposed of it to a Roman prince. Finally, at Venice, he commenced the gathering of a library, in which it is said, as one evidence of its extent, there were more than four thousand Bibles written in fifty-two languages[294].