Page:English Law and the Renaissance.djvu/89

 The cessation of the Year Books in 1535 at the moment when the Henrician Terror is at its height is dramatically appropriate. A great deal, however, has yet to be done before the relevant facts will be fully known. Mr C. C. Soule's Year-Book Bibliography, printed in Harvard Law Review, vol. xiv., p. 557, is of high importance. If by 'the Year Books' we mean a series of books that have been printed, then the Year Books become intermittent some time before they cease. The first eleven years of Henry VIII are unrepresented, and there are gaps between years 14 and 18 and between 19 and 26. It remains to be seen whether there are MSS. more complete than the printed series. Then we have on our hands the question raised by what Plowden says in the Preface to his Commentaries touching the existence of official reporters. Plowden says that he began to study the law in 30 Hen. VIII, and that he had heard say that in ancient times there were four reporters paid by the king. His words make it clear that the official reporters, if they ever existed, came to an end some considerable time before 30 Hen. VIII. The question whether they ever existed cannot be raised here. Mr Pike's investigations have not, so I think, tended to bear out the tale that Plowden had heard; and if the king paid stipends to the reporters, some proof of this should be forthcoming among the financial records. The evidence of Francis Bacon is of later date and looks like a mere repetition of what Plowden said