nearly daily on every subject. Percy carried out most of the literary work for which he is now remembered at Easton Maudit. When he became famous, he was made domestic chaplain to the Duke and Duchess of Northumberland, and was tempted into the belief that he belonged to the illustrious house of Percy. Through his patron's influence he became Dean of Carlisle Cathedral in 1778 and was ordained as Bishop of Dromore in County Down in 1782. His wife died before him in 1806; the bishop, blind but otherwise in sound health, lived another five years. Both were buried in the transept which Percy had added to Dromore Cathedral. Literary work The Reliques of Ancient English Poetry set the stage not only for Robert Burns, but also for Wordsworth and Coleridge's Lyrical Ballads. The book is based on an old manuscript collection of poetry, which Percy claimed to have rescued in Humphrey Pitt's house at Shifnal, Shropshire, "from the hands of the housemaid who was about to light the fire with it." The manuscript was edited in its complete form by JW Hales and FJ Furnivall in 1867–1868. This manuscript provides the core of the work but many other ballads were found and included, some by Percy's friends Johnson, William Shenstone, Thomas Warton, and some from a similar collection made by Samuel Pepys. Percy "improved" 35 of the 46 ballads he took from the Folio. In the case of The Beggar's daughter of Bednal Green (Bethnal Green), he added the historical character of Simon de Montfort, Earl of Evesham. In this version the ballad became so popular that it was used in two plays, an anonymous novel, operas by Thomas Arne and Geoffrey Bush, and Carl Loewe's ballad "Der Bettlers Tochter von Bednall Green". A fuller account of the history of the ballad can be found in "The Green" by A. J. Robinson and D. H. B. Chesshyre. Collections Percy's collection of c.120 volumes were kept by his daughters on his death and were presented to the Bodleian Libraries in 1933 by his great granddaughter, Miss Constance Meade. These were mainly literary works of the 17th-19th centuries, including annotated copies of Goldsmith, Johnson and other 18th century authors. Additionally, the collection includes a set of The Rambler (1756) with MS notes by Percy, and a set of The Idler (1761) with MS notes by Percy and Johnson. Printed ephemera, which