The main reason for enrolment on parchment, when first adopted by Congress, was English example. Technical phrases, tautologous terms, absurdities of law Latin and law French, all these, together with our jurisprudence, were borrowed directly from England, and with them came parchment, the use of which antedated these peculiarities. Of course it was before the manufacture of paper in England, which was not earlier than the reign of Henry the Seventh, and it was continued long after the manufacture had rendered it unnecessary. In Antiquity other substances were employed; but among European nations in modern times, previous to the invention of paper, parchment prevailed. In England, every manuscript, every book, every deed, every indenture, every contract, every record, judicial or other, was on parchment. So, also, was Magna Charta, wrung from King John in 1215, and still exhibited as a venerable curiosity in the British Museum. It must have been the case with the statutes and proceedings of Parliament; for, in fact, there was little else on which they could be written. These proceedings, together with the statutes, constituted what were called the Rolls of Parliament,--_Rotuli Parliamentorum_,--and they were preserved apart, with other parchment records. There is a verse of Scripture which has been quoted as describing the place where they were kept: “Darius the king made a decree, and search was made in _the house of the rolls_, where the treasures were laid up.”[318] The durability of parchment is attested by the manuscripts which illumine the great libraries of Europe. Among the treasures of the Vatican is a Virgil of the fourth century, and in the National Library of Paris is a Prudentius of an early date, both in a condition to survive the structures in which they are preserved. Abbeys, convents, churches, built with pious skill, have crumbled to dust, while their parchments continue to defy the tooth of Time. But this peculiar durability, so important before the invention of printing, when copies were few, has played its part. Parchment soon gave way to paper in judicial proceedings and records, probably from considerations of economy and convenience; but it continued longer in parliamentary proceedings. The Journals of the House of Lords, which have always been held to be public records, were formerly “recorded every day on rolls of parchment.”[319] The original usage with regard to the Journals of the other House seems to have been different; for we find in 1621, the year after the sailing of our Pilgrim Fathers, an express order that the Journals of the House of Commons “shall be reviewed and recorded on rolls of parchment.”[320] Notwithstanding the order, this usage does not appear to have prevailed with the Commons, and it was long ago discontinued by the Lords. But the statutes continued to be engrossed on parchment, and placed in the custody of the “Master of the Rolls.” * * * * *