Whether estimated by mere money value, or by a truer standard, the third, in order of time, of the Foundation-Collections, that of the ‘Harleian Manuscripts,’—was a much less important acquisition for the Nation than was the Museum of SLOANE, or the Library of COTTON; but its literary value, as all students of our history and literature know, is, nevertheless, considerable. Its first Collector, Robert HARLEY, the Minister of Queen Anne and the first of the Harleian Earls of Oxford, is fairly entitled to rank, after COTTON, COURTEN, and SLOANE, among the virtual or eventual co-founders of the British Museum. Chronologically, then, Sir Robert COTTON, William COURTEN, Hans SLOANE, and Robert HARLEY, rank first as Founders; so long as we estimate their relative position in accordance with the successive steps by which the British Museum was eventually organized. But there is another synchronism by which greater accuracy is attainable. Although four years had elapsed between the passing—in 1753—of ‘_An Act for the purchase of the Museum or Collection of Sir Hans Sloane, and of the Harleian Collection of Manuscripts, and for providing one general repository for the better reception and more convenient use of the said Collection, and of the Cottonian Library and of the additions thereto_,’ and the gift—in 1757—to the Trustees of those already united [Sidenote: THE OLD ROYAL LIBRARY, formed by PRINCE HENRY (son of James I) at St. James’.] Collections by King GEORGE THE SECOND, of the Old Royal Library of the Kings his predecessors, yet that royal collection itself had been (in a restricted sense of the words) a Public and National possession soon after the days of the first real and central Founder of the present Museum, Sir Robert COTTON. But, despite its title, that Royal Library, also, was—in the main—the creation of subjects, not of Sovereigns or Governments. Its virtual founder was HENRY, Prince of Wales. It was acquired, out of his privy purse, as a subject, not as a Prince. He, therefore, has a title to be placed among the individual Collectors whose united efforts resulted—after long intervals of time—in the creation, eventually, of a public institution second to none, of its kind, in the world. Prince HENRY’s story is not the least curious of the many life-stories which these pages have to tell. That small span of barely eighteen years was eventful, as well as full of promise. And it may very fitly be told next, in order, after that of COTTON, who was not only his contemporary but his friend. [Sidenote: THE MSS. OF LORD ARUNDEL.]