1. BODLEIAN LIBRARY.

[Compendium of the Acts of the Saints, Volume First. Printed by permission of the Superiors at the College of the Society of Jesus at Katsusa in the county of Takaku, province of Hizen, A.D. 1591.]

294 pages, in addition to a list of contents (2 pages), errata (4 pages), and the last leaf, on the reverse of which is TCVZZVQV | VA DAI NI- | QVAN NARI. | [Continuation in Volume the Second] title-page of vol. 2:

Pages 3–340, in addition to a list of contents (4 pages), errata (5 pages), and a glossary of difficult words (72 pages). This is a dictionary of difficult words with explanations in Japanese, and Portuguese equivalents or explanations.

In the center of the title-page of each volume is a small copper engraving representing St. Peter, surrounded by other saints. This plate, as well as the others used for several subsequent publications, was almost certainly engraved in Japan by a native artist who received his training in one of the Jesuit seminaries. In the "Lettera Annua del Giapone dal Marzo del 1593, sino al Marzo del 94" original: "Annual Letter of Japan from March 1593 to March 1594.", the writer says that some of the pupils had made great progress in painting—both in distemper and in oils—and in engraving on copper, copying the paintings and engravings that had been brought from Rome by the ambassadors. original: "No less progress are some of them making in painting, as well as in engraving copper plates for prints, because eight of them are exercising themselves in various paintings in distemper, and others in oil, and five in engraving plates: ... Those who engrave in copper do no less in their office, because they are already engraving with great naturalism the images that come from Rome, of which many have been printed with great pleasure and satisfaction to the Christians." It is true that the pictures here spoken of were for hanging up in houses as objects of devotion, and that no special mention is made of such unimportant pieces of work as small plates for title-pages, but careful inspection of the prints leads to the conclusion that they are the work of natives.

Cotton (Typographical Gazetteer, p. 276) has the following note: "Tacacum, or Tacaxuctium, Takagus, a town of Japan, situated in the island of Niphon, which was one of the settlements occupied by the Jesuit missionaries in the XVIth century.

In the Bodleian library (marked 8°. Z. 21. Th. Seld.) is a small volume, in Roman type, but Japanese language, and on silk paper, which was printed here by the Jesuits of the College of Cazzusa, a settlement three miles distant from the town of Arima. This work is in two parts, and appears to contain lives of the apostles and of some saints, having at the end a short Japanese