AUTHOR’SNOTE
The suggestions offered in this paper have sharpened themselves
considerably since 1979, when the Trustees of Dr Plume’s Library invited
me to deliver one of their Lectures and when I decided to offer public
answers to questions which I had been asking of myself about this
collection of books during some thirty years of sporadic but at times
extensive use of that Library. As time has passed, more and more
examples have accumulated to substantiate those answers (and to
illustrate my comments) and I have to thank the Trustees for charging me
with an interesting exercise in presenting the material in two quite distinct
forms: first, as a lecture to an audience whose range of interests and
whose familiarity with the Library’s contents was not restricted to that of
specialists in 17th-century history; secondly, in the following printed
format. The lecture had to be the occasion for an illustrated enquiry with a
fully participating audience—it was not designed as a formal reading—
and its substance could not usefully be transcribed into a printed essay
such as this; even the illustrative material has often had to be replaced
with equivalents more suitable for the changed medium of presentation.
Readers who were also members of that audience in 1981 should not,
therefore, be surprised at the changed construction but they will find that
the questions and my answers are the same. I have, however, ventured to
press home more positively here my conclusions and I must point out that
they are not necessarily the opinions of the Trustees or of their Librarian.
My thanks are especially due to Canon A J Dunlop, Chairman of the
Trustees; to Mr Victor Gray, County Archivist of Essex, for his
encouragement in the completion of this study; to Mrs G. Shacklock,
Thomas Plume’s Librarian, for her continuous help in my exploration of
the Library; and to the 1981 audience for their encouragement and
comments. This is also the opportunity for me to express my gratitude to
a former Librarian, the late Mr S.G. Deed, under whose magisterial
guidance 1 first made acquaintance with the world of 16th- and 17th-
century book production.
W. J. Petchey