Add MS 78391

EVELYN PAPERS. Vol. CCXXIV. `Devotions of Mrs Blaggs which I copied out at the Request of my Lady Sylvius & from whom I borrowed them afterwards & intend to Restore'; [aft. 1678]. Copies by Evelyn of prayers, sermon notes, hymns and verse by Margaret Blagge, wife of Sidney Godolphin, paginated by him, `81-119’, as part of an unidentified longer work. Lady (Anne) Sylvius, née Howard, and her sister Dorothy were former maids of honour and friends of Margaret Godolphin. Evelyn’s `The Life of Mrs Godolphin’ was completed in 1684 at the instigation of the former and this volume was probably intended as an additional memorial although the pagination sequence does not follow on from that of either of the known manuscripts (both at Harvard University, Houghton Library). A note has been added to the title after 1698, `and now by her [Lady Sylvius’s] Permission I would have them presented to my Lady Harriet Godolphin’; i.e., the wife of Francis Godolphin, afterwards 2^nd Earl of Godolphin, only child of Margaret Godolphin. These copies were made by Evelyn from Margaret Blagge’s papers, to which her husband gave him access after her death. His preliminary note states: `Amongst innumerable Papers & Fragments which this Devout Lady has left; & which if put together would make a Considerable Folio) I present your Ladyship with this Specimen onely, for a tast, & to shew how Religiously she spent her houres of Recesse & how Universal (& choice) her Devotions were’. A few original devotional manuscripts of Margaret Godolphin are in the following volume. Formerly Evelyn MS 122.

ff. iii + 22. Quarto notebook with modern marbled paper cover. 195 x 150mm.