and yet the following leaf (i. e. Fol. 16 in the original state of the MS., Fol. 15 in its present condition) is the first leaf of a perfect quaternion, and the seven gatherings following are all complete quaternions; room for Fol. 15 must therefore be found in the mutilated gathering, and it must have contained nine leaves. After the eight complete quaternions, comes at Fol. 79 another gathering, which has been mutilated; it begins at Matt. xxvii. 54, and consists at present of nine whole leaves, with the edges of three more still visible; the three first leaves of this gathering are in St. Matthew and in their right order (Fol. 79-81); then (Fol. 82-87) are six leaves containing the end of St. John and the beginning of St. Luke, and after this may be seen the projecting edges of the three sheets of vellum whose other halves gave us St. Matthew xxvii. 54 foll.; the three pages however have been cut out, and, together with the rest of the quaternion proper, are bound up later in the book, at the beginning of St. John's Gospel, forming part of an imperfect quaternion which we find there (Fol. 203-207). Now if we bring these five leaves back to their original position, and expel the intruding leaves 82-87, we shall get our quaternion entire (Fol. 79-81 St. Matthew, 203-207 St. John). After this we have three regular quaternions (Fol. 208–231), and then apparently ten leaves, or possibly nine, are missing: the gathering must have been a quinion, or else a quaternion with an extra leaf, as the gatherings before and after it are perfect. It is followed by a quaternion (Fol. 232–239), and the next page (240a) is a fragment of a leaf from St. John xxi. 8 foll., and quite out of place in its present position. Fol. 240b begins a gathering consisting of 240, 241, then a page left unnumbered by mistake, and then Fol. 242-246; this makes a quaternion. After this come five complete pages, to which we might add in its right place the fragment bound at 240a, forming altogether a ternion. This is at the end of the Book as it now stands, and we have to go back to the middle for the rest of the Gospels, viz. the end of St. John, and the whole of St. Luke and St. Mark. After the above-mentioned ternion we place in their right order the six intruding leaves found at the end of St. Matthew (Fol. 82-87); these give us another ternion. Then (Fol. 88-95) comes a quaternion, followed by two quinions (Fol. 96-115), and these in turn followed by five quaternions, taking us on to page 155. Here ends the consecutive portion of St. Luke; a leaf is now missing, and the four

remaining pages of St. Luke (there ought to be five, but one is lost), are bound up, as was noticed above, at the beginning of St. Matthew (Fol. 9-12). This would make six leaves, and the leaf after these, which had the early part of St. Mark written upon it, is also missing, which makes seven; consequently Fol. 156 ought to be the concluding leaf of this quaternion, which has been partly lost, partly moved to the beginning of St. Matthew; and so it is, for the next leaf, Fol. 157, begins a new quaternion; following this is another irregular gathering of nine leaves (Fol. 165-173); then a ternion (Fol. 174-179), and two quaternions (Fol. 180-195). Finally, Fol. 194-202 was an irregular gathering of nine sheets, but two leaves are missing. This brings us to the end of the volume as originally bound, and by adding the restored gatherings together, we may see of how many pages the Manuscript consisted.

Thus the Manuscript when complete must have been a volume of perhaps more than average, but still not excessive thickness; there is no sign of there having been any leaves before the first page of St. Matthew or after the last page of St. Mark; the subscription of the writer occupies the reverse side of the leaf on which the last verses of that Gospel are written. Of the 273 leaves, St. Matthew took up 82; St. John, 62; St. Luke, 78; St. Mark, 51.

At present the following passages are missing: two pages after fol. 6, containing Matt. iii. 15-iv. 23; two after fol. 8, containing Matt. v. 25– vi. 4; one after fol. 14, containing Matt. vi. 28-vii. 8; after fol. 231, nine or ten pages have disappeared, containing John x. 11-xii. 38; fol. 240 a has partly disappeared, so that we lose nearly all of John xxi. 8-20; after fol. 155 a page has disappeared, containing Luke xxiii. 23–35; and again after fol. 10, containing Luke xxiv. 11-39; after fol. 12 we lose another page with Mark i. 7-21; and after fol. 199 we lose two more, containing Mark xv. 5-36.

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The division into chapters, marked by the illuminated capitals and coloured lines, is interesting; there are 34 chapters out of the surviving portion of St. Matthew, beginning at the following places in our notation:i. 1, ii. 1, iii. 1, iii. 13, v. 17, vi. 16, vii. 28, ix. 9, ix. 35, x. 16, xi. 1, xii. 1, xii. 33, xiii. 1, xiii. 24, xiii. 53, xiv. 34, xvi. 13, xvii. 1, xvii. 22, xviii. 12, xix. 1, xx. 1, xx. 17, xx. 29, xxi. 28, xxii. 15, xxiii. 29, xxiv. 1, xxiv. 15, xxiv. 46, xxvi. 1, xxvi. 36, xxvii. 1, xxvii. 54, xxviii. 1.

In St. John there are twenty-five chapters surviving, divided respectively at i. 1, i. 35, ii. i, iii. 1, iii. 22, iv. 1, iv. 43, v. 1, v. 25, vi. 1, vi. 22, vii. 37, viii. 21, ix. 1, x. 1, xiii. 1, xiv. 15, xv. 1, xv. 17, xvi. 16, xvii. 1, xviii. 1, xviii. 28, xix. 23, xx. I, xxi. 1.

In St. Luke we have thirty-six chapters, beginning at i. 1, i. 26, ii. 1, iii. 1, iv. I, iv. 14, iv. 44, v. 27, vi. 12, vi. 37, vii. 1, viii. 1, viii. 22, ix. 1, ix. 28, ix. 51,x. 3, x. 38, xi. 14, xi. 37, xii. 13, xii. 49, xiii. 10, xiv. 1, XV. I, XV. II, Xvi. I, xvi. 19, xvii. 11, xviii. 1, xix. 29, xx. 9, xxi. 5, xxi. 37, xxii. 39, xxii. 63. In St. Mark we have twenty-one chapters, beginning at i. 1, ii. 13, iv. 1, iv. 35, v. 21, vi. 6, vii. 1, viii. 1, viii. 27, ix. 2, x. 30, x. i, x. 32, x. 46, xi. 27, xiii. 1, xiii. 14, xiv. 1, xiv. 32, xv. I, XV. 42.

§ 4. Orthography, &c. The orthography of our MS. does not present any very striking variations from ordinary use, and such as it has, are

more often, I think, the result of carelessness on the part of the scribe than of intention. But although the very formation of his handwriting and the numberless corrections of his own slips by himself, shew him to have been a careless writer, it is at the same time unadvisable to dismiss the problem of a peculiarly-spelt word on the ground of carelessness, until other means of solving it have failed. A fuller comparative examination of early Latin MSS. may strengthen the supposition that cases of apparently careless spelling may be really due not to accident, but to different modes of pronunciation current in the regions to which the MS. or its ancestors belonged: and thus the orthography of a MS. may throw great light on the origin of the text which it presents. I have therefore collected some of the more regularly recurring cases of peculiar orthography in q.

In the vowels ae and e seem interchangeable; Iudea and Iudaea are found impartially; Abraee in Luke iii. 8; Esaias and Æsaias, Matt. xv. 7; xiii. 14; Cesar, Matt. xxii. 21; egrimonia, terre, prestat, etc.; and on the other hand aedunt, blasfaemiae, habaebat, occultae; a is found occasionally for egenaratio, Matt. xxiv. 34; processarat, Luke ii. 36; u and o are occasionally interchanged: soffuco and suffuco, Matt. xiii. 7, 22; Luke viii. 7, 14, 33; diurnu, Matt. xx. 2; pseodoxpi, Matt. xxiv. 24; and speodoprofetis, Luke vi. 26. In the consonants we may notice examples of 'dittography,' consummat, Luke ix. 54; atullerunt, John ii. 8; and Iordannis usually (but not John iii. 26, etc.); s is more frequently doubled, as in accussarent, effussus, occissa, transsire, etc., and is frequently added after x, as in benedixserint, dixserunt, crucifixserunt, intellexsistis, surrexsit, exsiens, exsemplum, exsercitum, maxsillam, etc.; and yet side by side with these we have such forms as audisent, ingresus, percusit, misus, posumus; the omission and insertion of h seem to shew that then as now that letter had an uncertain foothold in popular pronunciation, and, expelled from places to which it rightly belonged, revenged itself by trespassing where it had no claim; we have on the one hand abuisti, ora (hour), odie, ospes, proibere, etc., and on the other hiret, habundantius, haridorum, habiit, hista, etc. The omission of other letters may be due partly to slovenly and hasty pronunciation, partly to careless writing; we have mandcare, pecctum, mlites, spientibus, in which not only a letter but a syllable is lost, and also autm and atem (for autem), sient (for scient),

fatum (for factum), omis (for omnis), ueturus (uent-), iuicem, batizare, copus, confetim, Agusto (Luke ii. 1). Letters are dropped at the end of words, giving us such forms as accesserun(t), plu(s), ueneri(t), praeparatu(s), sun(t), uocan(s), and also at the beginning, as in (i)bi, (u)tique. These instances seem to point to careless pronunciation rather than careless writing; but for the following the scribe must surely be responsible :Haplography

Syllables dropped.

Crederei, discipulosuos, eritibi, etertius, maioresunt, queme, qümercestra (for qūm merces uestra Mt. v. 12), utestimonium. aspiens (aspici-), congrauit (congrega-), dit (dicit or dixit), hierolyma, mistrauimus, pisculos, rinquetur (relinqu-) tentes (tenen-).

Syllables reduplicated pateter, ueritatatis, menente, farisisei, os

tendendite, patitientiam, etc.

Of other peculiar forms of orthography, qūm as the contracted form of quoniam will at once strike the reader's eye; it is employed throughout the Manuscript, qum not being used once, and quom only in Matt. xxvii. 24. I have not yet found any other examples of MSS. spelling the contracted form in this way, and it may possibly serve to identify the locality in which our book was written; ihs is as usual found for the contraction of the Sacred name, but His is found in Luke iv. I (cf. its frequent use in Cod. Bobiensis k); thensaurus, puplicanus, profeta, adulescens are regularly employed, as also Moyses, not Moses; absconsus, absconditus are both found; the form nequa is judged by Bishop Wordsworth to be not a mistake, but an old indeclinable noun1.

The other usual contractions and abbreviations are found; ds and dīs, išl as a rule for Israel, though its is also found. The line over, or more frequently after, the last letter of a word, and often with a dot under it, marks the m or n, but even this ordinary contraction seldom occurs except at the end of a line; final -us, -ue, or -uit is marked by the sign; the most frequently occurring ligatures are ae, ant, uc, ue, ui, ur, us, and ns. Though the numerous corrections by the first hand in almost every page are mostly genuine corrections of previous slips, yet I cannot help thinking that many of the letters, especially vowels, Old-Latin Biblical Texts. No. I. p. xxxix, also No. II. p. ccxlvi.