gave the Camden Society free access to the registers of wills at
Lambeth--documents exactly similar to those at Doctors' Commons. The
Prerogative Office is, probably, the only public office in the kingdom
which is shut against literary inquirers.

"The results of such regulations are obvious. The ancient wills at
Doctors' Commons not being accessible to those to whom alone they are
useful, yield scarcely any fees to the office; historical inquirers are
discouraged; errors remain uncorrected; statements of facts in
historical works are obliged to be left uncertain and incomplete; the
researches of the Camden Society and other similar societies are
thwarted; and all historical inquirers regard the condition of the
Prerogative Office as a great literary grievance.

{216}

"The President and Council of the Camden Society respectfully submit
these circumstances to your Grace with a full persuasion that nothing
which relates to the welfare of English historical literature can be
uninteresting either to your Grace personally, or to the Church over
which you preside; and they humbly pray your Grace that such changes
may be made in the regulations of the Prerogative Office as may
assimilate its practice to that of the Public Record Office, so far as
regards the inspection of the books of entry of ancient wills, or that
such other remedy may be applied to the inconveniences now stated as to
your Grace may seem fit.

"(Signed) BRAYBROOKE, President.
THOMAS AMYOT, Director.
HENRY ELLIS.
J. PAYNE COLLIER, Treas.
HARRY VERNEY.
H. H. MILMAN.
JOSEPH HUNTER.
WILLIAM J. THOMS, Sec.
CHS. PURTON COOPER.
THOS. STAPLETON.
WM. DURRANT COOPER.
PETER LEVESQUE.
THOS. J. PETTIGREW.
JOHN BRUCE.
BERIAH BOTFIELD.
BOLTON CORNEY.

_25. Parliament Street, Westminster,_
_13 April, 1848._"

As the Archbishop stated his inability to afford any relief, THE CAMDEN
SOCIETY availed themselves of the appointment of the Commission to inquire
into the Law and Jurisdiction of the Ecclesiastical and other Courts in
relation to Matters Testamentary, to address to those Commissioners, in the
month of January, 1853, a Memorial, of which the following is a copy:

"To the Right Honourable and Honourable the Commissioners appointed by
Her Majesty t