The subjects represented in English miniatures are for the most part the same as those in contemporary French manuscripts; but the martyrdom of Saint Thomas of Canterbury occurs more frequently in English than in any continental manuscripts[123]. Almost immediately after the event in 1170 this scene began to be represented; see above, page 108. _St George and the Dragon._ Another specially English subject is Saint George, who was at first the Crusaders' Patron and then the national Saint of England. He is usually represented as a Knight on horseback slaying the dragon with a lance. This subject did not come into popular use till the fourteenth century[124]. Both in England and in France, during the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, manuscript _Chronicles_ and _Histories_ of both ancient and modern times formed a large and important class of manuscripts; and these were usually copiously illustrated with miniatures. The _Chronicles_ of Sir John Froissart was justly a very favourite book on both sides of the Channel[125], and many richly illuminated manuscripts of it still exist; see below, page 139. _MS. Chronicles._ The British Museum possesses a magnificent manuscript of the _Chronicles of England_ in seven large folio volumes, which were compiled and written at the command of Edward IV. The miniatures which decorate this sumptuous work are partly Anglo-Norman and partly Flemish, in the style of the school of the Van Eycks at Bruges. One favourite form of _Chronicle_, giving an abstract of the whole World's history, was in the shape of a long parchment roll, illuminated with miniatures in the form of circular medallions. Some of these great rolls were written and illuminated by English miniaturists, but they appear not to have been as common in England as they were in France; see below, page 139. On these rolls the writing usually continues down the strip, not at right angles to the long sides, as on classical papyrus rolls. CHAPTER IX. FRENCH MANUSCRIPTS. _Psalter of St Louis._ During the thirteenth century "the art of illumination as it is called in Paris"[126] flourished under the Saintly King Louis IX. (1215-1270) as much as it did in England under Henry III. Manuscripts of most exquisite beauty and refinement were produced in Paris, in style little different from those of the Anglo-Norman school. One of the most beautiful and historically interesting is a _Psalter_ (Paris, _Bibl. Nat._) which is said to have been written for St Louis about 1260. This is a large folio, copiously illustrated with sacred subjects minutely painted on a ground of burnished gold enriched by tooling. Many of the miniatures are framed in a beautiful architectural composition of cusped arches, with delicate open tracery supported by slender columns. _Perfect finish._