This noble institution may be said to have originated in the bequest of Sir Hans Sloane, who, dying in 1752, left his immense collections of every kind to the nation, on the condition of paying L20,000 in legacies to different individuals; a sum considerably less than the intrinsic value of the medals, coins, gems, and precious metals of his museum. This bequest included a library of 50,000 volumes, among which were 3566 volumes of manuscripts in different languages; a herbarium of 334 volumes; other objects of natural history, to the number of six-and-thirty or forty thousand, and the house at Chiswick, in which the whole was deposited. The Harleian collection of manuscripts, amounting to 7600 volumes, chiefly relating to the history of England, and including, among many other curious documents, 40,000 ancient charters and rolls, being about the same time offered for sale, parliament voted a sum of L30,000, to be raised by lottery, and vested in trustees, for the establishment of a National Museum. Of this money, L20,000 were paid to the legatees of Sir Hans Sloane, L10,000 were given for the Harleian Manuscripts, and L10,000 for Montague House as a receptacle for the whole. Sloane's Museum was removed thither with the consent of his trustees. In 1757, George II., by an instrument under the great seal, added the library of the kings of England, the printed books of which had been collected from the time of Henry VII., the manuscripts from a much earlier date. This collection was very rich in the prevailing literature of different periods, and it included, amongst others, the libraries of Archbishop Cranmer, and of the celebrated scholar Isaac Casaubon. His majesty annexed to his gift the privilege which the royal library had acquired in the reign of Queen Anne, of being supplied with a copy of every publication entered at Stationers' Hall; and in 1759 the British Museum was opened to the public.[21]