somewhat the effect of running a line of road through a fertile but
unfrequented land; and Conybeare's "Illustrations of Anglo-Saxon
Poetry," published in 1826, fruit of the Oxford chair, had a great
effect in calling the attention of the educated, and more than any other
book in the present century has served as the introduction to Saxon
studies.

It was not until the close of the eighteenth century that the "Beowulf"
was discovered. Wanley had catalogued it, but without any idea of the
real nature of the book. Thorkelin was, however, attracted from Denmark;
he came and transcribed it, and prepared an edition which was nearly
ready in 1808, when his house was burnt in the bombardment of
Copenhagen. But he began again, and lived to see his name to the Editio
Princeps of "Beowulf," at a time when there were few who knew or cared
for his work. He left two transcripts, which are now our highest source
in many passages of the poem. The original having been scorched in the
fire of 1731, the edges of the leaves went on cracking away, so that
many words which were near the margins and which are now gone, passed
under the eye of Thorkelin.

In 1832, a learned German, Dr. Blume, discovered at Vercelli, in North
Italy, a thick volume containing Anglo-Saxon homilies, and some sacred
poems of great beauty. The poems were copied and printed under the care
of Mr. Thorpe, by the Record Commission, in a book known as the
"Appendix to Mr. Cooper's Report on the Fœdera," a book that became
famous through the complaints that were made because of the long years
during which it was kept back. A few privileged persons got copies, and
when Grimm, in 1840, published the two chief poems of the new find, the
Andreas and the Elene, which he had extracted from Lappenberg's copy, he
had a little fling at "die Recorders," as if they kept the book to