Note 1 — Chapter II · (continued 4)

: It seems to me possible, though I would not be too sure, that the book about which Bigot wrote to Milton was one entitled Modus tenendi Parliamentum apud Anglos, by Henry Elsynge, Clerk of the House of Lords, and father of the Henry Elsynge who was Clerk of the Commons In the Long Parliament (Wood, Ath. III. 363-4). The book, which had been sent forth under Parliamentary authority in 1641, was a standard one; and manuscript copies of it, or drafts for it, more complete than itself, may well have been extant in such places as the Cotton Library or Bradshaw's. Actually Elsynge's autograph of the book, dated 1626, was extant in London at the date of Milton's letter, though not in the Tower. An edition of the book, "enriched with a large addition from the author's original MS.," was published in 1768; and the MS. itself is now in the British Museum (Bonn's Lowndes, Article "Elsynge").