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A History of Printing in Colonial'Maryland
| Month Anno Domini 1706. In the Fifth Year of the Reign of Our Most | Gracious Sover-
eign Lady Queen Anne, &c. His Excellency | John Seymour Esq- [sic] being Governour,
were Enacted these | Laws following viz. | [Annapolis: Printed by Thomas Reading. 1706.]
FoL B-C2, D1; 5 leaves; pages 1-10: text, with heading as above; p. 10: "Finis".
Leaf measures: 14 3/5 x 9 1/16 inches. Type page, p. 2:304 x 151 mm.
No copy of the separate issue of the session laws of April 1706 is known to exist, but the bibliographical evi-
dence gives clear indication that a separate issue did exist at one time, and that when this separate issue was
printed a number of extra sheets were run off and held for later inclusion in their proper chronological order in
the volume of collected laws described below as All the Laws of Maryland Now in Force, of which volume the
sheets described in this entry form a part. This point is discussed below in the collation and note of No. 17.
1707
17. MARYLAND, PROVINCE OF. [All the Laws of Maryland Now in Force. Published by
Authority of the General Assembly. Annapolis: Printed by Thomas Reading. 1707.]
Fol. The single known copy is imperfect. The collation of the remaining leaves is as follows: B-U2, X1, B-C2,
D1, Aa-Ee2; 54 leaves; pages 1-77, [78]; 1-10; 95-114; pp. 1-3: laws of April session 1704, with session heading;
pp. 4-65: laws of September session 1704, with session heading; pp. 65-75: laws of December session 1704, with
session heading; pp. 75-77: laws of May session 1705, with session heading; p. 77: "Errata"; p. [78]: blank; pp.
1-10 (second series, signatures B-C2, D1): laws of April session 1706, with session heading; p. 10: "Finis"; pp.
95-106: laws of March session 1707, with session heading; pp. 106-113: "Several Acts of Assembly formerly made
and declared to be in force"; p. 113: note by the Printer in two paragraphs, the first of which is given below in
note to this entry, and the second, containing evidence that Thomas Reading was the printer of the volume, is
quoted here: "These are to give Notice to all Gentlemen &c. that are any ways interested in private Acts of As-
sembly, that they may have them printed at Inrge [sic, for 'large']: And may likewise be furnished with blank
Bills, Bonds, Writts Bills of Exchange, Bills of Lading, Administration Bonds, Testamentary Bonds, Letters of
Administration, Letters Testamentary, Warrants for Appraisers &c. with any other Matters printed at reason-
able Rates by Thomas Reading living in the Town and Port of Annapolis."; p. 114: "The Index".
Leaf measures: 14 3/8 x 9 inches. Type page, p. 2:300 x 151 mm.
An explanation of the irregular pagination and signature sequence of this volume is found in the first para-
graph of the note on p. 113, which reads as follows: "The Reader is hereby desired to take Notice that in the
Assembly made Anno 1706 the Pages are Folio'd I 2 3 &c by reason the Laws made that Sessions were ordered
to be first Printed so that they could not be truly ascertained, and instead thereof add 80 81 82 &c. otherwise the
Index will be false." One assumes from this note that the printer had issued separately the session laws of Apri
1706 at some time previous to the publication of the present "collection," and that having, as the records show
the printing of the "collection" in view at this time he had planned to save himself a great deal of extra composi-
tion in the future by running off, without change of pagination or signatures, a number of extra sheets of these
laws to be held and later to be bound in their proper chronological order in the "collection." If this assumption
be correct, it follows that the signatures [X 2] and [Y-Z2] of the first series were never printed, and that the earlier
printed sheets just described, B-C2 and D1, pp. 1-10, were substituted for them.
In spite of Reading's note, there exists an actual discrepancy in the pagination by which pp. 93-94 remain
unaccounted for, a fact which does not necessarily mean that a leaf has been lost from the volume, but rather
bears out certain other evidence that the printer was thoroughly confused by his own expedient for bringing his
pagination into accord with his index. This is seen to be the case from an examination of the "Index", which, is
spite of his pains, is "false", for therein p. i of the second series appears not as p. 81 but as p. 78, and a similar
discrepancy occurs for all pages in the second series 1-10. Whoever made the Index considered that as p. 1 was
the first page of type after p. 77, it should accordingly be called p. 78, even though it was a recto page.
The title under which this work is entered here is that given to it in the preface of Trott's Laws of the Plan-
totions, London, 1721. See the foregoing narrative (Chapter Three) for a more extended historical and biblio-
graphical discussion of this, the second collection of Maryland laws.
The presumably unique copy of the volume has been deposited for safe keeping in the Peabody Library of
Baltimore by a descendant of Robert Goldsborough, its earliest owner. The first two leaves are torn away in
the lower right hand corner destroying a portion of the text; corners and edges are gnawed throughout; last leaf
is worm-eaten, making Index imperfect, but except for that portion of the first two leaves already referred to the
text is complete. See Plate III for photographic reproduction of page 113, containing the two notes quoted above
[166]
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