Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 45.djvu/13

  417-18; Strype's Annals, in. ii. 599, iv. 1-3, 220 ; Whitgift, ii. 504; Lives of Twelve Bad Men, ed. Seccombe, pp. 49-50.]  PERKINS, HENRY (1778–1855), book collector, was born in 1778, and became a partner in the firm of Barclay, Perkins, & Co., brewers, Southwark. He was elected a fellow of the Linnean Society in 1825, and was also a fellow of the Geological and Horticultural Societies. In 1823 he commenced the formation of a library at his residence, Springfield, near Tooting, Surrey, which he soon enlarged at the sale of Mr. Dent's collection. Messrs. John and Arthur Arch of 61 Cornhill, London, were then appointed his buyers, and rapidly supplied him with many scarce and valuable books. He died at Dover on 15 April 1855, when his library came to his relative, Algernon Perkins of Hanworth Park, Middlesex, who died in 1870. The books were sold by Gadsden, Ellis, & Co. at Hanworth on 3, 4, 5, and 6 June 1873, the 865 lots producing 26,000l., being the largest amount ever realised for a library of the same extent; ten volumes alone going for ten thousand guineas. The ‘Mazarin Bible,’ two volumes, printed upon vellum, purchased for 504l., sold for 3,400l.; another copy, on paper, obtained for 195l., brought 2,690l.; ‘Biblia Sacra Latina,’ two volumes, printed upon vellum in 1462, the first edition of the Latin Bible with a date, bought at Dent's sale for 173l. 5s., sold for 780l. Miles Coverdale's Bible, 1535, imperfect, but no perfect copy known, purchased for 89l. 5s., brought 400l. Among the manuscripts, John Lydgate's ‘Sege of Troy’ on vellum, which cost 99l. 15s., went for 1,370l.; ‘Les Œuvres Diverses de Jean de Meun,’ a fifteenth-century manuscript of two hundred leaves, brought 690l., and ‘Les Cent Histoires de Troye,’ by Christine de Pisan, on vellum, with one hundred and fifteen miniatures, executed for Philip the Bold, duke of Burgundy, sold for 650l. The 865 lots averaged in the sale rather more than 30l. each.

[Times, 4, 5, 6, and 7 June 1873; Athenæum, 1 March 1873 pp. 279–80, 14 June 1873 pp. 762–3; Proceedings of Linnean Soc. of London, 1855–9, p. xliii; Livres payés en vente publique 1000 fr. et au-dessus, depuis 1866 jusqu'à ce jour, aperçu sur la vente Perkins à Londres, Étude Bibliographique par Philomneste Junior, Bordeaux, 1877; A Dictionary of English Book Collectors, pt. ii. September 1892.]  PERKINS or PARKINS, JOHN (d. 1545), jurist, was educated at Oxford, but left the university without taking a degree. Going to London, he was called to the bar of the Inner Temple, and is spoken of as a ‘fellow’ there. He may possibly have been the John Perkins who was a groom of the royal chamber in 1516. He died in 1545, and is said to be buried in the Temple Church. Perkins is remembered by a popular text-book which he wrote for law students. Its title is, as given by Wood, ‘Perutilis Tractatus sive explanatio quorundam capitulorum valde necessaria,’ but the first edition probably had no title-page. It was printed in 1530 in Norman-French. An English translation appeared in 1642, and another in 1657. There is a manuscript English version in Brit. Mus. Harl. MS. 5035, which was made in the time of James I. A copy of the book itself forms Brit. Mus. Hargrave MS. 244. The fifteenth edition, by Richard J. Greening, was issued in 1827. Fulbeck, in his ‘Direction or Preparative to the Study of the Law,’ praises Perkins for his wit rather than his judgment.

[Tanner's Bibl. Brit.; Greening's Preface to Perkins; Fulbeck's Direction, ed. Stirling, p. 72; Wood's Athenæ Oxon. ed. Bliss, i. 147; Reg. Univ. Oxford (Oxford Hist. Soc.), i. 149; Boase's Reg. Collegii Exoniensis (Oxford Hist. Soc.), p. 757.]  PERKINS, JOSEPH (fl. 1711), poet, born in 1658, was the younger son of George Perkins of Slimbridge, Gloucestershire. He matriculated from Oriel College, Oxford, on 16 July 1675, and graduated B.A. in 1679. After leaving Oxford he obtained a post as chaplain in the navy, and sailed to the Mediterranean in the Norfolk under Admiral Edward Russell (afterwards Earl of Orford) [q. v.] He was very prolific in complimentary verse, and wrote Latin elegies on Sir Francis Wheeler (1697) and other naval worthies; he was, however, cashiered in the course of 1697 for having, it was alleged, brought a false accusation of theft against a naval officer. He wrote a highly florid Latin elegy upon the Duke of Beaufort, which was printed in 1701, and by flattering verses and dedications, together with occasional preaching, he was enabled, though not without extreme difficulty, to support a large family. His efforts to obtain preferment at Tunbridge Wells and at Bristol were unsuccessful. In 1707 he produced two small volumes of verse: ‘The Poet's Fancy, in a Love-letter to Galatea, or any other Fair Lady, in English and Latin’ (London, 4to), and ‘Poematum Miscellaneorum a Josepho Perkins Liber primus’ (no more printed) (London, 4to). Most of his miscellanies were in Latin, and he styled himself the ‘Latin Laureate,’ or, to air his Jacobite sympathies, the ‘White Poet.’ He tried to curry favour among the nonjurors, and wrote in 1711 ‘A Poem, both in