scriber has entirely suppressed the conclusion of her work. This MS. contains only 61 fables.
The second has all the prologue, and the conclusion. It has 83 fables.
The third is the completest of all, and contains 104 fables.
Monsieur le Grand says that he had seen four MSS. of these fables in the libraries of Paris, but all different as to the number of them. He cites one in the library of St. Germain des Prés as containing 66 fables; and another in the Royal library, No 7615, with 102[1]. As he has said nothing about the other MSS. it is to be supposed that he has purposely mentioned that which had the greatest number of fables, and that which had the least. Under this idea the Harleian MS. No 978, is the completest of all that have been yet cited.
But whence have arisen these various readings? Did Mary publish originally but a part of her work? Did she afterwards add supplements? or were transcribers permitted to make selections of her fables, to retain those which they liked best, and to reject the others? The latter opinion seems the most probable, for we perceive that the transcriber of the Cotton MS. has entirely omitted the lines which Mary had placed at the end of her work. We must, therefore, conclude that these persons, copying oftentimes merely on their own account, gave themselves but little trouble about posterity; and that, in this case, there were formerly many imperfect MSS. as at present we find mutilated and spurious editions of printed books.
Monsieur le Grand assigns another reason. He contends that the transcribers took the liberty of inserting many strange pieces
- ↑ Fabliaux, Vol. IV. p. 330.
