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DEDICATORY EPISTLE.
xxix

tol stones and paste, with which I have endeavoured to imitate them, I am convinced your opinion of the difficulty of the task will reconcile you to the imperfect manner of its execution.

Of my materials I have hut little to say: They may be chiefly found in the singular Anglo-Norman MS., which Sir Arthur Wardour preserves with such jealous care in the third drawer of his oaken cabinet, scarcely allowing anyone to touch it, and being himself not able to read one syllable of its contents. I should never have got his consent, on my visit to Scotland, to read in these precious pages for so many hours, had I not promised to designate it by some emphatic mode of printing, as The Wardour Manuscript; giving it, therefore, an individuality as important as the Bannatyne MS.,the Auchinleck MS., and any other monument