probably never heard of Sir Gilbert Hay's previous version,) he added this to his other translations from the French, and having printed his own translation, he addressed the volume to King Richard the Third. It has no date, but must have been printed about the year 1484; and his edition is acknowledged to be one of the rarest specimens of his press. Lewis in his Life of Caxton, 1737; Oldys in his British Librarian, 1738; Ames and Herbert in their Typographical Antiquities, 1749 and 1785; and Dibdin, in his enlarged edition of that work, 1810, and also in his Bibliotheca Spenceriana, 1815, have each given a more or less detailed account of Caxton's translation.

In the Advocates' Library, Edinburgh, among the collection of MSS. which belonged to Sir James Balfour of Denmyln, Lord Lyon in the reign of Charles the First, there is a volume, to which he has prefixed this title, "Collectanea Domini Davidis Lyndesay de Monthe Militis Leonis Armorum Regis." This volume is described by Dr Leyden^[8] in the Preface to his republication of "The Complaynt of Scotland," but he has confounded two persons of the same name, and who held the same office, at an interval of half a century. The volume, which contains nothing to identify it with Sir David Lyndesay the Poet, is here noticed, from containing a copy of "The Order of Knighthood," without the name of the translator. This is evidently a transcript from Caxton's printed volume, omitting the concluding Address to Richard the Third, in which Caxton introduces his own name as the translator; while the transcriber has used his own discretion in adapting the language to the Scotish orthography and dialect.

Dr Leyden passes over this portion of the MS. in a very summary manner, and strangely says, that it, along with "The Buke of Cote-Armouris," which immediately follows, in Lyndesay's MS., was transcribed from Dame Juliana Berners's Treatise on Hunting, Hawking, &c., which is usually known as the "Booke of St Albans."

The following extracts from the copy of Caxton's volume, in the British Museum, will be sufficient to convey to the reader some idea of the work itself; and to form a comparison of the English and Scotish versions. The first leaf is here given in black letter, line for line, in imitation of the original:—

¶ Here after foloweth the mater and tenour of this said Booke.

And the Fyrst chapyter saith hou the good Heremyte deuysed to the Esquyer the Rule and ordre of Chyualrye.

A Contrey ther was in which it happed that a wyse knyght whiche longe had mayntened the Ordre of Chyualrye/ And that by the force & noblesse of his hyghe courage and wysedom and in auenturyng his body had mayntened warres justes & tornayes & in many batailles had had many noble victoryes & gloryous & by cause he sawe & thought in his corage y^t he myȝt not long lyue as he which by long tyme had ben by cours of nature nyghe unto his ende/ chaas to hym an heremytage/ For nature faylled in hym by age/ And hadde no power ne vertu to vse armes as he was woned to do/ Soo that thenne his herytages/ & all his rychesses he lefte to his children/ and made his habytacion or dwellynge place in a greete wode habondaunt of watres and of grete trees/ and hygh berying fruytes of dyuerse manyers/ And fledde the world/ by cause that the feblenesse of his body in the whiche he was by old age fallen/

And that he dishonoured not that/ whiche that in honourable thynges and aventurous hadde ben longe tyme honoured/

The same knyght thynkynge on the dethe/ remembryth the departynge fro this world in to that other/ and also thought of the ryght redoubtable sentence of oure lord in the whiche hym behoued to come to the day of Jugement/ In one of the partyes of the same wode was a fayr medowe/ in whiche was a tree wel laden and charged of fruyte in his tyme/ of which the knyght lyued in the forest/ And vnder the same tree was a fontayne moche fayre and clere/ that arowsed and moysted all the medowe/ And in the same place was the knyght acustomed to come euery daye for to preye and adoure God Almyghty/ To whome he rendryd thankynge of the honoure that he had done to him in this world alle the dayes of his lyf/ In that time it happed at the entryng of a strong wynter/ that a kynge moche noble/ wyse and ful of good custommes/ sente for many nobles/ by cause that he wold hold a grete courte/ And by the grete renommee that was of thys courte/ It happed that a squyer moeued hym for to goo thyder/ in entencion that there he shold be made knyght/

¶ Thus as he wente all allone rydynge vppon his palfroy/ It happed/ that for the trauaylle that he had susteyned of rydynge/ he slepte vpon his horse/

¶ In the meane whyle that he rode soo slepynge/ his palfroye yssued oute of the ryght waye/ and entryd in to the forest/ where as was the knygte Heremyte/ And soo longe he wente/ that he came to the fontayne at the same tyme that the knyght whiche dwellyd in the wode to doo his penaunce was there comen for to praye vnto God/ and for to despyse the vanytees of this worlde/ lyke as he was acustomed euery day/ whan he sawe the squyer come/ he lefte his oroyson/ and satte in the medowe in the shadow of a tree/ And beganne to rede in a lytyl book that he had in his lappe/ And whan the palfroy was come to the fontayne/ he beganne to drynke/ And the squyer that slept anone felte that his hors meued not/ and lyghtly