=Source.=--_Paston Letters_, vol. iii., No. 869. [+Note.+--The original manuscript is much decayed, and the portions between brackets represent attempted reconstructions of the text.] _The inventory of the English books of John [Paston] made the fifth day of November, anno regni regis E. iiij...._ 1. A book had of mine hostess at the George ... of _The Death of Arthur beginning at Cassab[elaun_, _Guy Earl of] Warwick_; _King Richard Cœur de Lion_;[33] A chronicle ... to Edward III. 2. Item, a book of Troilus[34] which William Bra ... hath had near ten years, and lent it to Dame ... Wyngfeld, and _ibi ego vidi_. 3. Item, a black book with _the legend of Lad[ies,[35] la Belle Dame] saunce Mercye_; _the Parliament of Bird[s_;[36] _the Temple of] Glass_;[37] _Palatyse and Scitacus_; _the Me[ditations]_; _the Green Knight_.[38] 4. Item, a Book in print of the Play of the [Chess]. 5. Item, a book lent Midelton, and therein is _Belle Da[me sans] Mercy_; _the Parliament of Birds_; _Ballad ... of Guy and Colbronde_; _of the Goose_ ... _the Disputation between Hope and Despair_; _... Mare haunts_; _the Life of Saint Cry[stofer]_. 6. A red book that Percival Robsart gave me _... of the Meeds of the Mass_; _the Lamentation of Childe Ypotis_;[39] _a prayer to the Vernicle_;[40] [a book] called _the Abbey of the Holy Ghost_. [33] A romance of the fourteenth century, first printed by Wynkyn de Worde (1509-1528). [34] Chaucer's _Troilus and Cressida_. [35] Possibly Chaucer's _Legend of Good Ladies_. [36] Possibly Chaucer's _Parliament of Fowls_. [37] A poem by Lydgate (_circa_ 1370-1451). For a text of this poem see Early English Text Society, Extra Series, lx. (1891). [38] An anonymous ballad of the fourteenth century. [39] In this ballad Ypotis = Epictetus (see Horstmann's _Altenglische Legenden_ (1881)). [40] The "Vernicle," or "Veronica Kerchief" was one of the most popular legends of the Middle Ages. Veronica, a lady of Jerusalem (afterwards identified with the woman that had an issue of blood), seeing Christ sinking beneath the burden of the Cross, wiped His face with a veil. After this work of mercy the face of Christ was found imprinted on the veil. 7. Item, in quires:--Tully _de Senectute_[41] in divers [places] whereof there is no more clear written. [41] Cicero's _De Senectute_. 8. Item, in quires:--Tully or Cypio[42] _de Ami[citia]_ left with William Worcester. [42] Scipio. In Cicero's dialogue, _De Amicitia_, the friendship of the chief speaker, Gaius Lælius, with the younger Scipio, is taken as the model of the theme. "Equidem ex omnibus rebus, quas mihi aut fortuna aut natura tribuit, nihil habeo quod cum amicitia Scipionis possim compare." 9. Item, in quires, a book of _the Policy of In[gelond]_. 10. Item, in quires, a book _de Sapientia_[43] ... wherein the second person is likened to Sapi[ence]. [43] Lydgate's _Werke of Sapience_.