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LONDON:

WERTHEIMER, LEA AND CO., PRINTERS,

CIRCUS PLACE, LONDON WALL.

PREFACE.

THE CARDINAL ARCHBISHOP OF WESTMINSTER having entrusted the Editors with the publication of a selection of historical documents from the Archives of the Arch-diocese, they have thought it best, with His Eminence's approbation, to begin the series with the earlier portion of the Diary of the English College at Douay. This Diary, or register of the principal occurrences in the College, is made up of seven parts, each of which bears the name of Diarium or Hemerologium, and is distinguished from the others by the numeral prefixed to it. At the beginning of the year 1716, the Rev. Robert Witham, who had just been appointed President, caused a careful search to be made for the College Diaries then existing, and he has recorded the result of these investigations in his own handwriting on the first pages of the MS. book containing the Diarium Septimum.

He found that there had been frequent interruptions in the keeping of the Diary, but that whatever had been recorded was entered in six manuscript books; two of which, we may add, viz., the Fourth and Fifth Diaries, are now bound together in one volume. The First Diary, entitled Catalogus Sacerdotum, etc., begins, according to the President's statement, with the foundation of the College in 1568, and consists of little more than the lists of those who came to the College, were sent to England, and suffered martyrdom. The Second Diary commences in 1575 and ends in 1593. Next follows an interruption of five years. The Third Diary then narrates what took place between 1598 and 1633. After this occurs an interval of eight years, during which nothing was recorded. The Fourth Diary resumes the narrative at the death of President Kellison in 1641, and goes on to 1647. It is followed immediately by the Fifth Diary, from 1647 to 1654. An interval of twenty-two years, from 1654 to 1676, now en

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sues, in which no register of events was kept. The Sixth Diary begins in 1676 and ends in 1692, though a few entries were occasionally made down to 1695. From this date nothing could be found except a register of the names of the inmates, and on separate sheets of paper lists of those who were admitted to the College and sent to England.

Such were the results of the search instituted by President Witham. To supply in some degree the deficiencies which he had discovered, he has prefixed to the Seventh Diary a few memoranda of events which happened between 1689 and 1715. The Seventh Diary begins on Feb. 5, 1715, and ends May 2, 1778. It is almost wholly in President Witham's handwriting up to a little while before his death in 1738. The entries in the latter portion of this Diary are very scanty, and eight entire years are passed over without notice.

The Diaries were of course kept at Douay until the break-up of the College and the nearly total destruction of its library and archives in the first French revolution. How complete this was we learn from the account of an eye-witness, published in the "Catholic Magazine" · of 1831 (vol. i. p. 459). "Our valuable library," the narrator writes, "had met with a cruel fate. For some months ago after our arrest it had been plundered at discretion by those who had been appointed to take care of it. By order of the magistrates, waggon-loads of books were conveyed from the library to the arsenal to make military cartridges. Folio volumes of firm paper, regardless of their contents,

were preferred for this barbarous purpose. . . . . Many rare and curious

volumes and the whole treasure of our inestimable manuscripts, consisting of original letters and correspondence with Rome and England, authentic memoirs and other precious documents, which had been deposited here as in a place of safety out of the reach of that persecution which had raged so long in our own country, were dissipated and destroyed by men ignorant of their value."

When the members of the College were at length released from imprisonment and allowed to return to England (March 2, 1795) they took with them the Diary, or at least the greatest part of it, and it

remained for many years in the custody of the Rev. John Daniel, the last president of the house. Shortly before President Daniel's death, which happened at Paris, Oct. 3, 1823, he consigned it to the Rev. Francis Tuite, titular President of the ancient Paris Seminary, and afterwards Vicar-General to Bishop Griffiths, Vicar Apostolic of the London District. In 1835 or 1836, the Rev. F. Tuite (who died March 15, 1837) lent three of the volumes, viz., those containing the Third, Fourth, Fifth and Seventh Diaries, to Canon Tierney for the edition of Dodd's Church History, which he was then preparing. The First and Second Diaries were never seen by Canon Tierney, who imagined that they had perished. (Tierney's Dodd, II. 166, note 1.) These facts have been gathered partly from a memorandum written by Canon Tierney and attached to the Diarium Septimum, and partly from a receipt given by him for the volumes of the Diary and other documents belonging to the Vicar Apostolic of the London District. At the death of Canon Tierney in 1862, the Diaries lent to him were borrowed by Dr. Goss, Bishop of Liverpool, who died in 1872, and they are now, together with the First and Second Diary, in the Archives of the See of Westminster. The Sixth Diary, however, is still missing. Possibly it was not brought to England from Douay with the others, but this seems unlikely; or it may have been, since then, lost, or even destroyed. In the Archives of the See of Westminster there is also a small MS. Diary, extending from Aug. 18, 1770, to May 28, 1781. Unlike the others, which are all in Latin, this Diary is in English. But besides the Diaries which have been mentioned, there is another quoted by Canon Tierney in his edition of Dodd (II. 166, note 1.) as "The Rheims Diary for 1579 and 1580, a MS. belonging to the Dean and Chapter." The long passage which he has cited from it clearly shows that it was not part of the Diarium Secundum, but an independent Diary. Although it was in existence a few years ago, when Canon Tierney used it, no trace of it now remains. It may, perhaps, have been lent to some one, and mislaid and forgotten by the borrower or his representatives. We have such scanty informa

tion about the period with which it deals that its loss is very much to be regretted.

The Diarium Primum, the first of the two Diaries now printed, contains a succinct account of the foundation of the College in 1568, followed by two catalogues, the one of students ordained priests, and the other of priests sent on the English mission. The first of these lists reaches from 1573 to 1632, and the second from 1574 to 1644. The Diary is in four different handwritings. The first is that of Dr. Thomas Worthington, third President of the College; the second and fourth have not been identified; and the third is that of the Rev. Francis Barber of Monmouthshire, who was born in 1593 or 1594, and lived the greater part of his life in the College. He was ordained priest in 1618, and after having filled the offices of General Prefect of Studies and Procurator, died in 1633 (Acta Visitationis Collegii Anglorum Duaci, 1626, p. 187. MS. Old Brotherhood of the Secular Clergy, formerly called the English Chapter). In the MS. book which contains the Diarium Primum various things have been noted from time to time which relate to the College, but form no part of the Diary itself. Among these memoranda the principal place is occupied by lists of the students who took the College oaths either as scholars on the foundation or as simple students. These lists range from 1627 to 1780. They frequently give not only the dioceses of the students, but the dates of their birth, the names of their parents, and the names they assumed at the College. The subscriptions to the oaths are in many instances autographs. The MS. book itself was always kept in the President's room (Diarium Primum, p. 48, note).

The Diarium Secundum, the Second of the Diaries now published, is also in several different handwritings, but it has not been possible to ascertain the names of the respective writers. This Diary is followed by a number of letters and other documents of the period, which have been entered on blank leaves of the MS. book, but in no way belong to the Diary. These have all been printed as they stand in the MS. The list of priests sent into England, which is the last of these docu

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