Tanner's _Bibl. Britan._, p.
618. He is described, in both authorities, as being a very
learned Fellow of Merton College, where he built and
furnished _a noble library_; on the wall of which was
painted his portrait, with this inscription: "GULIELMUS
REDAEUS, EPISCOPUS CICESTRENSIS, MAGISTER IN THEOLOGIA,
PROFUNDUS ASTRONOMUS, QUONDAM SOCIUS ISTIUS COLLEGII, QUI
HANC LIBRARIAM FIERI FECIT." Many of Read's mathematical
instruments, as well as his portrait, were preserved in the
library when Harrison wrote his description of England,
prefix'd to Holinshed's Chronicles; some of the former of
which came into the possession of the historian. For thus
writes Harrison: "William Read, sometime fellow of Merteine
college in Oxford, doctor of divinitie, and the most
profound astronomer that liued in his time, as appeareth by
his collection, which some time I did possesse; his image is
yet in the librarie there; and manie instruments of
astronomie reserued in that house," &c. _Chronicles_ (1587),
edit. 1807, vol. i., p. 237. In the year 1808, when I
visited the ancient and interesting brick-floored library of
Merton College, for the purpose of examining early printed
books, I looked around in vain for the traces, however
faded, of Read's portrait: nor could I discover a single
vestige of the BIBLIOTHECA READIANA! The memory of this once
celebrated bishop lives therefore only in what books have
recorded of him; and this brief and _verbal picture_ of Read
is here drawn--as was the more finished resemblance of
Chaucer by the pencil, which Occleve has left behind--

=That thei that have of him lost thoute and mynde
By this peinture may ageine him fynde.=

HUMPHREY, Duke of GLOUCESTER, "commonly called _the good_,
was youngest brother to Henry V. and the first founder of
the university library in Oxford, which was pillaged of the
greater part of its books in the reign of Edward the Sixth."
Park's edit. of the _Royal and Noble Authors_; vol. i., 198.
"As for the books which he gave (says Wood) they were very
many, more by far than authors report; for whereas 'tis said
he gave 129, you shall find anon that they were more than
treble the number." The Duke's first gift, in 1439, of one
hundred and twenty-nine treatises, was worth, acc