Chetham's Library MS A.3.54

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Basse, William (  -1653?): Polyhymnia

Binding: half green leather. Spine, in gold: Chetham crest. BASSE/M.S.

Endpaper, verso: stamp: W. Boddington, Binder, Todd St., Manchester.

57 leaves of paper 18.7 x 15 cms, unnumbered and unlined.

1^r In modern hand: Hanwell, Oxford. In C17th hand: Norreys [Francis, Lord Norreys].

2^r Blank, but shows signs of having been pasted down. Was this the original endpaper? In 1860, Corser described the manuscript as being in its original binding (see below).
2^v Chetham press mark in ink: Glass C4/3/7
Note by James Crossley, in ink, referring to Corser's ownership of and description of the manuscript and of its lot number in the Heber sale.

3^r Cutting from the British Magazine 1783: Bycot, in Oxford, The seat of the Earl of Abingdon.

4^r Title page: POLYHYMNIA |  A Poem | written by | William Basse gent. |
Nos convivia, nos praelia virginum,
Sectis in juvenes unguibus acrium,
Cantamus: vacui, sive quod urimur,
Non praeter solitum leves.
Hor: lib 1. Ode 6.

5^r - 6^r Dedication. To the Right Noble and Vertuous Lady, the Lady Bridget Countesse of Lindsey, Barronnesse of Ersbie, & of Ricot &c.

7^r - 8^v Verses To the Right Honorable Francis Lord Norreys, Earle of Berkshiere (in his dayes)

9^r - 9^v To the Lady Falkland uppon her goeing into Ireland: 2 sonnets.

9^v - 10^r Of a great Floud.

10^r - 10^v Of the Raine-bowe.

11^r - 18^v The youth in the Boate.

19^r - 39^v The Second part of The youth in the Boate.

40^r - 41^v The Morall.

42^r - 42^v Of Pen and Pensill, uppon A fayre & vertuous Ladyes Picture.

43^r - 44^v On the House of a Noble Knight & worthy favourer Of my Muse.

45^r - 50^r An Elegie of a rare singing Bull-fynch, found dead in his Cage in the cold & wet. June 19 1648.

50^v - 53^r Of the four mile Course on Bayards-greene, sixe times run over by two famous Footmen Patrique Dorning & William O'Farrell.

53^v - 55^r The Spirituall Race.

For a description of the manuscript, see:

1. Manuscript catalogue of the Revd. Thomas Corser's Library, p. 237. (Mun.A.6.37)
2. Corser, Thomas: Collectanea Anglo-poetica ... part 1, 1860 pp. 199-206 (Chetham Society O.S. 52)

The volume was, according to Corser, probably bought by Hanwell the Oxford bookseller when Ricot, the seat of the Norreys family, was taken down. Heber acquired it from Hanwell and it was sold as lot  70 in part II of the Heber sale (10th Feb 1836) for £3.5.0. It was sold as lot 192 of the first part of the Corser sale (28th July 1868) for £1.11.0. to Honnor. It was in Chetham's Library by 1883 when volume VI of the printed catalogue, in which it appears, was published.

For another manuscript poem by Basse, see Halliwell Phillipps broadside no. 2757, 'On Mr. William Shakespeare who died in Aprill 1616'.

Neg. microfilm J.R.L. February 1968.

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