Norman historians, a work which is now of rare occurrence, and it has
never been reprinted.

Valuable materials for a new edition were, however, collected early in
the eighteenth century, by William Bessin, a monk of St. Ouen; and
these, before the revolution, were preserved in the library of that
abbey. Bessin had been assisted in the task by Francis Charles Dujardin,
prior of St. Evroul, who had collated the text, as published in the
collection of Norman historians, with the original manuscript in his own
monastery, to which latter Duchesne unfortunately had not access, but
had been obliged to content himself with a copy, now in the Royal
Library at Paris. It is to be hoped, that the joint labors of Bessin and
Dujardin may still be in existence, and may come to light, when M.
Liquet shall have completed the task of arranging the manuscripts in the
public library at Rouen. The manuscript which belonged to St. Evroul,
and was always supposed to be an autograph from the hands of Ordericus
Vitalis himself, was discovered during the revolution among a heap of
parchments, thrown aside as of no account, in some buildings belonging
to the former district of Laigle. It is now deposited in the public
library of the department of the Orne, but unfortunately, nearly half
the leaves of the volume are lost. The earliest part of what remains is
towards the close of the seventh book, and of this only a fragment,
consisting of eight pages, is left. The termination of the seventh book,
and the whole of the eighth are wanting. From the ninth to the
thirteenth, both of these inclusive, the manuscript is perfect. A page
or two, however, at the end of the work, which contained the author's
life, has been torn out.--At the beginning of the sixteenth century, the
manuscript was complete; for it is known that, at that time, a monk of
St. Evroul made a transcript of it, which extended through four volumes
in folio. These volumes were soon dispersed. Two of them found their way