PREFACE.  XXVil

This  again  is  Welsh  ;  even  Herefordshire,  up  to  the
time  of  Henry  the  Eighth,  was  frequently  if  not  usually
considered  as  a  Welsh  county.
Had  there  been  any  truth,  or  evidence  in  support  of  the
Oxford  story,  Antony  a  Wood  would  have  been  sure  to
have  ferretted  out  the  facts  :  all  he  says  in  his  History  of
Duke  Humphrey's  Library  is.,  "  That  several  scholars
would,  upon  small  pledges  given  in,  borrow  books  thence  :
which  pledges,  being  not  half  worth  the  books  that  were
borrowed,  were  never  restored.  Polydore  Vergil,  as  tra-
dition tells  us,  borrowed  many  after  such  a  way  ;  but  at
length  being  denied,  did,  upon  petition  made  to  the  King,
obtain  his  licence  for  the  taking  out  of  any  manuscript  for
his  use  (in  order,  I  suppose,  for  the  collecting  materials  for
his  English  History  or  Chronicle  of  England),  which,  being
imitated  by  others,  the  library  thereby  suffered  very  great
loss."*

Even  Burnet  has  a  fling  at  Polydore,  but  it  is  for  his
character  ofWolsey  only.  He  says,  "  Neither  Erasmus
nor  Polydore  Vergil  made  their  court  dexterously  with  the
Cardinal,  which  did  much  intercept  the  King's  favour  to
them ;  so  that  the  one  left  England,  and  the  other  was
but  coarsely  used  in  it,  who  has  sufficiently  revenged  him-


*  Wood's  Hist,  and  Antiq.  of  Oxford,  edit,  by  Gutch,  4°  Oxf.  1796,  vol.
ii.  p.  ii.pp.  918,  919.
XXV111  PREFACE.
self  upon  the  Cardinal's  memory."*  Yet  who  is  there
that  has  studied  the  history  and  correspondence  of  Wol-
sey's  time  but  sees  the  corroboration,  in  every  part,  of
the  portrait  which  Polydore  Vergil  has  drawn  ?

Wharton,  in  the  Anglia  Sacra,  has  given  a  character  of
Polydore  very  different  from  Savile,  Gale,  and  Nicolson.
