Meanwhile it is high time that attention should be drawn to that noble series of volumes now issuing from the press under the editorship of scholars whose reputation is assured, and whose work continues to enhance their reputation--high time that we should begin to do something like justice to the labourers, who have deserved so well at the hands of such Englishmen as have any sentiment of loyalty to the great thoughts, the great doings, and the noble lives of their forefathers. The philosopher, who 'holds the mirror up to nature,' has not of late, as a rule, missed his reward. The historian, who in his dogged, patient, toilsome fashion holds the mirror up to the life of bygone ages, has received among us scant recognition, and generally is rewarded with but barren honour. What has been done and still is doing will be best understood by briefly reviewing the progress of that movement, which has brought about the great revival of English Historical study, and under the influence of which the opinions and convictions of educated men have passed through a very decided change, one destined to produce still greater and more unlooked for changes of sentiment and belief before the present century shall have closed. It is just fifty years since 'the Father of Record Reform,' as he has been justly called, received his patent creating him Master of the Rolls. Although as far back as the year 1800 a Commission was issued for the methodizing and digesting the National Records, and for printing such calendars and indexes as should be thought advisable; and though during the next twenty-seven years many works of supreme interest and importance were printed at the public expense, the enormous extent of our National Records were known to few, and the difficulty of consulting them, (dispersed as they were through a score of different depositories) was enough to deter all but the most resolute enquirers. It was Lord Langdale who first set himself to reduce the chaos of our archives into something like order. When the old Record Commission expired in 1837, it was by Lord Langdale's influence that the Public Record Act was passed on the 14th of August, 1838, whereby the Records named therein were placed under the custody of the Master of the Rolls for the time being, and hereupon a new era began. Nevertheless it was not till July 1850 that a vote was obtained from the Treasury for the erection of a national depository, wherein our vast archives should be assembled under a single roof, and not till 1855 that the magnificent _Tabularium_ in Fetter Lane was opened for the reception of our muniments.