The small _Book of Hours_ belonging to M. Maurice de Rothschild (published in facsimile by Count Delisle), the _Missal of St. Denis_ in the Victoria and Albert Museum, the _Book of Hours_ designed for Jeanne de France, Queen of Navarre, in the Yates Thomson Collection, form a group of beautiful codices which have rightly been compared with this MS. of Queen Jeanne d'Evreux. [Illustration: Plate XXX. Photo. Giraudon. MAY. Pol de Limbourg. From The "Très Riches Heures du Duc de Berry." _To face page 160._] The greatest gem, however, of all these illuminated MSS. is unquestionably the precious volume known as _Les Très Riches Heures_ of the Duc de Berry. The Duc d'Aumale himself relates the history of its acquisition in 1855. On his way to visit his mother Queen Marie Amélie, then lying ill at Nervi, he visited the Villa Pallavicini at Pegli, near Genoa--at that time a boarding-school for young ladies--in order to examine a MS. to which his attention had been drawn by Sir Antonio Panizzi, Principal Librarian of the British Museum. Without any hesitation he arranged on the spot to purchase the work of art for a sum of 18,000 francs. On his return to Twickenham (where he was then residing), the Duchess herself carefully unfolded the newly acquired treasure from its "_cassetta foderato di velluto_" and every connoisseur of note at once hastened to examine the wonderful MS. which the Duke had been so fortunate as to acquire. As early as 1857 Waagen wrote about it with much detail; later Count de Laborde, Anatol Gruyer, and Leopold Delisle followed; and recently, and more exhaustively, Paul Durrieu also. But it was Delisle who made the important discovery that the _Très Riches Heures_ could be identified with the MS. described in the Inventory of the Duc de Berry: "_Item une layette plusiers cayers d'une 'Très Riches Heures' que faisoient Pol et ses frères, très richement historiez et enluminez_." The same writer also discovered that these leaflets were valued at 500 _livres tournois_ (about 20,000 francs), a very large price for that time, and one which showed the high value in which this manuscript was held even at that date.