The Manuscript of these sheets is imperfect both at the commencement and end; in one or two places part of a leaf has been torn off, and in another a folio has been abstracted, whilst the first page is in many places illegible. Its contents and orthography are printed literally, and the imperfections in the copy pointed out by stars: the few blanks which will be found, also occur in the MS. The earliest notice of it which has been discovered is in the Lansdown MS. 737, which contains numerous extracts made from it by Peter le Neve, Norroy King of Arms, from 1704 to 1729, who says he bought the original "of ---- Wynde, Esq. _and sold it for_ the same price _to the Right Honorable Lord Harley, son and heir of the Earl of Oxford_ ---- 1723;" and adds in the margin, "It was the book of Sir Orlando Bridgeman, Knight, Lord Keeper, and in the beginning is his hand-writing." The words printed in italics have been almost obliterated, perhaps in consequence of Le Neve's having afterwards retained the volume instead of selling it; but perhaps because it was surreptitiously taken from Lord Oxford's collection. The next notice which occurs of it, is in Walpole's "Anecdotes of Painting," from which it appears that in 1762 it was in the possession of Mrs. Bridgeman, of Hanover Square. The name might suggest the idea that her husband was a descendant of Sir Orlando Bridgeman, who purchased it in 1634, and hence that the book was in her possession in consequence of that relationship; but this is contradicted by the fact of its having passed from Sir Orlando's family to Mr. Wynde and from him to Le Neve sometime after 1704, who in 1723 sold it to the Earl of Oxford, though in 1762 we find it belonged to a Mrs. Bridgeman. After that year nothing more is known of it, than that it was purchased about a twelvemonth since at the sale of an Undertaker and Broker, of the name of Gomme. In the fly leaf at the beginning is the following memorandum, which Le Neve says was written by Sir Orlando Bridgeman:--"Accounts of H. EIGHT, and signed with his own hande, I gott it by Chance this yeere, 1634." With the exceptions just noticed, the MS. is in fine preservation. From Le Neve's extracts the contents of the folio which is now wanting, have been recovered, though not in the original words, and will be found at the end of this volume; but all the other imperfections seem to have existed when in his possession, for he takes no notice of the first folio; he expressly says of pages 131, 132, 133, that the leaf was then torn; and the last folio of the MS. was the same as at present. Walpole conjectures that they were the accounts kept by "Sir Bryan Tuke, the Treasurer of the Chambers," but it is much more likely that they were those of Sir William Fitz-William, afterwards Earl of Southampton, Treasurer of the Household: nothing positive, however, can be said on the subject.