Many Coptic, Syriac, and Arabic manuscripts have been recovered from the numerous monasteries of Palestine, Asia Minor, and Egypt. Several travellers who have managed to overcome the suspicion of the monks and their unwillingness to open their literary hoards to strangers, or to part with any of the volumes, have found immense numbers of books hidden under dust and rubbish in vaults and cellars or stowed away in chests, where they were probably thrust at some time when danger threatened them. Books written in these monasteries themselves in earlier days, or brought thither from other monasteries further east, have thus lain forgotten or neglected for centuries, or, if they were noticed at all, it was only that they might be put to some ignoble use. Thus some were found acting as covers to two large jars which had formerly held preserves. "I was allowed to purchase these vellum manuscripts," says the author of _Monasteries of the Levant_, "as they were considered to be useless by the monks, principally, I believe, because there were no more preserves in the jars." In another case some large volumes were found in use as footstools to protect the bare feet of the monks from the cold stone floor of their chapel. As we have already seen, Christian scribes not only preserved the writings of the Fathers of the Church, as well as the Holy Scriptures, but also directed much of their attention to the classic works of poetry and philosophy. In every monastery from Ireland to Asia Minor, from Seville to Jerusalem, the work of transcribing and transmitting sacred and secular literature was carried on, and had we at the present day one half of the fruits of this labour we should be rich indeed. But we have also seen that many causes have contributed to the destruction of old writings, of which carelessness and ignorance are by no means the least. The well-known story of Tischendorf's discovery of the oldest copy of the New Testament in existence,[1] in a basket of fuel at a monastery near Mount Sinai is but a single example, and that a modern one, of the dangers to which these ancient books were liable, and to which they too often fell victims. The danger was long ago recognised, however, and a canon of the third Council of Constantinople, held in 719 A.D., enacted "That nobody whatever be allowed to injure the book of the Old and New Testament, or those of our holy preachers and doctors, nor to cut them up, nor to give them to dealers in books, or perfumers, or any other person to be erased, except they have been rendered useless by moths or water or in some other way. He who shall do any such thing shall be excommunicated for one year." The same Council also ordered the burning of heretical books. [1] The Codex Sinaiticus, now at St Petersburg.