Welsh Journals

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William Murray, bishop of Llandaff, suggests that the editor has mis- understood his text (p. 235). Among the most interesting of the references to Wales are letters dated 1686 from William Watkins, the Sidneys' Glamorgan collector of rents, in one of which he offers advice to the third earl on the granting of the advowson of Coychurch (' it being my duty to informe your lordshippe that it wilbe of some reflection if any be presented whoe cannot preach in Welsh'); in the other, Watkins comments more freely on the matter to a fellow-servant, Charles Olmieres (not Olivieres, as the index reference on p. 763 has it). In an appendix there are two Penshurst inventories, one for 1627 and the other for 1677. They show considerable differences in the layout of the house and its contents. The earlier says nothing of the milkhouse, 'buntinghouse' and buttery, but itemizes paintings in the 'longmatted gallery'. The latter gives a total of the pictures, merely distinguishing between small and large, framed and unframed; the whole lot (with the furnishings in the gallery) is valued at only £ 64. This 1677 inventory concludes with the laconic entry: 'Item, in books, 100 less than the value of the sheets etc. in the linen-keeper's charge which are apprized at 117 Ii. 16s.' The second earl was, in fact, a keen book-collector, purchasing rarities from Spain and elsewhere. This volume costs £ 10 and is clearly unlikely to find many private purchasers. Its value to the student is difficult to assess. Many documents are not transcribed in full but are printed as an amalgam of precis and exact quotation. Presumably, the judgment of the editor in deciding what to summarize and what to print in extenso is sound, but some readers may feel that what is sometimes quoted at length is, in this context, hardly worth quoting at all: for example, the odd extract from the registers of the Parlement of Paris, 7 September 1641 (pp. 411-12). IVAN ROOTS Exeter THE GREAT REBELLION, 1642-1660. By Ivan Roots. B. T. Batsford Ltd., London, 1966. Pp. x, 326. 45s. This single-volume history of the Great Rebellion by Professor Roots will be warmly welcomed and meets a real need. Not everyone will agree upon the proportions allotted to the three crucial decades. The author has, in part, anticipated such criticism and justifies the attention given to the sixteen-fifties because these years are 'too readily brushed aside as a mere tottering obstacle to the inevitable Restoration of 1660' (p. vii). Here he