COLLEGE BOOKS

The Books of the Colleges present several forms, each having its own object,–“in conservationem omnium rationum annalium evidentiarum et pandectarum, quæ commentarium rerum gestarum latino nomine dicimus, præter librum matriculationis”;–most of them are the registers of proceedings in the several branches of the corporate economy: each College Officer has one or more of them under his charge and for his regulation in the department to which he is appointed. The Bursar's department presents a collection truly voluminous, but very uninviting to the general reader. The assertion of rights, description of titles and boundaries, negotiations in bargains and suits, account of receipt and expenditure, hold out small promise except to those closely connected with the system. Their contents have little charm for the philosophical historian, though they may before now have engaged the interest of a curious and indefatigable arithmetician. But the department of the Registrar (Secretarius Registri) is more promising; albeit to ensure regularity and certainty, dry form has been prescribed and adhered to, yet the scribe has occasionally caught the spirit of his office, and under the influence of ‘pia memoria’, personal admiration, or esprit de corps, or even a sense of the humourous, has infringed an official formality by annotating a singular coincidence, recording a feeling of the time, or marking a valuable historical fact.