At the same time, while the main Object of the Royal Historical Society in undertaking this work must naturally be to render the whole Of the matter these treatises contain accessible to the members, the literary interest which attaches to these writings has not been altogether neglected. It is hoped that the work Of grouping the mss. And dis criminating the insertions has been so far accomplished as to facilitate the work Of anyone who may hereafter under take the work Of issuing a critical edition Of the text. Several Of the fourteenth century mss. Are written in French closely corresponding to that in the Statute Book, but the earlier mss. Give readings which appear to be somewhat more colloquial; and there is very great difficulty in attempting to reconstruct the language that Walter of Henley personally used, either in dictating or in writing. This difficult task has not been attempted in the present edition the text in each case is a simple transcript Of a single ms., which has been reproduced, without correction, even in those cases where there were Obvious slips on the part of the tran scribers. Though it was tempting to make a more ambitious effort, there is reason to believe that, by supplying a text which has not been tampered with under pretence of cor rection, the Society has furnished a sound basis to students for further investigations. In this translation, also, the requirements Of the modern historical student have been kept in view, as the main Object has been to render the matter of these treatises readily accessible. In no case, therefore, has the English been sacrificed in the attempt to reproduce the construction Of the French sentences as closely as possible, while the text affords the means of verifying the substantial correctness Of the translation. Doubtful and disputed renderings are for the most part discussed in the Glossary.
