Note 256 — The Library.

"Having finished his topography of Ireland, which consisted of three books, he published it at Oxford, A.D. 1187, in the following manner, in three days. On the first day he read the first book to a great concourse of people, and afterwards entertained all the poor of the town. On the second day he read the second book, and entertained all the Doctors and chief scholars: and on the third day he read the third book, and entertained the younger scholars, soldiers, and burgesses."—"A most glorious spectacle (says he), which revived the ancient times of the poets, and of which no example had been seen in England." This is given by Dr. Henry (b. iii., ch. 4, § 2), on the authority of Giraldus's own book, De rebus a se gestis, lib. i. c. 16. Twyne, in his arid little quarto Latin volume of the Antiquities of Oxford, says not a word about it; and, what is more extraordinary, it is barely alluded to by Antony Wood! See Mr. Gutch's genuine edition of Wood's Annals of the University of Oxford, vol. i., pp. 60, 166. Warton, in his History of English Poetry, vol. i., Diss. ii., notices Giraldus's work with his usual taste and interest.