Page:Gesta Romanorum - Swan - Wright - 1.djvu/83

Rh Gesta certainly is, that it was intended for the same work as the original; but that, in the transcription, with the latitude which the "Adam scriveners" of old invariably allowed themselves, many alterations, (miscalled improvements,) were made, together with some additions. The English translations of this last compilation vary frequently from their original. For instance, in the eighteenth chapter of the MS. ["English"] Gesta, fol. 17. a knight falls in love with Aglaës, daughter of the emperor ; but in the English translation of the story (in 1648, a thin 18mo. containing forty-four stories) this same person is styled. It forms "The fourteenth History." Now the fact, that no manuscript of this Gesta, exists in any of the catalogues of continental libraries, is easily accounted for, on the supposition of its being transcribed in England, and