188 HIS LORDSHIP'S PATRONAGE

county consist mainly of the proceedings of the local court, deed books,
wills, and other probate papers. Among the provincial records we should
note the loss of some Council Proceedings, notably those from Sept.,
1703, to Oct., 1714, from Dec., 1715, to Aug., 1721, and from Sept.,
1770, to 1777; of the Journals of the Lower House for October, Novem-
ber, and December, 1773; and of the Proceedings of the Court of Appeals
from 1729 through 1748 and from 1761 to 1788.

A limited number of state papers remain outside the Hall of Records
building. The Maryland Historical Society at Baltimore has a few letters
of Gov. Seymour and Lt. Gov. Eden (published in the Maryland
Historical Magazine, II [1907], XVI [1921], and XVII [1922]) and
the Library of Congress has transcripts of a number of Sharpe letters
(published in ibid., XII [1917], 370-383). Among the Gilmor Papers
(4 v. ) at the Maryland Historical Society are many historical documents
obtained by the late Robert Gilmor of Baltimore (d. 1848) from
Horatio Ridout, Esq., son of Lt. Gov. Sharpe's secretary and principal
heir. There exist elsewhere two old private collections of transcripts, the
Chalmers Papers (25 v. ) at the New York Public Library and the Sparks
Manuscripts at the Harvard College Library. The Maryland materials in
the former are available on microfilm at the Maryland Historical Society
and those in the latter at the Enoch Pratt Free Library in Baltimore.

In the magnificent Archives of Maryland series the Maryland Historical
Society began publication (1883) of what are now the holdings chiefly
of the Hall of Records proper. The Archives now (1952) consist of sixty-
four large volumes. These include all the extant colonial Proceedings of
the Governor and Council (11v. ) and those of the General Assembly
(32 v. ) j the Correspondence of Lt. Gov. Sharpe, 1753-71 (3 v. with
parts of two others); Minutes of the Board of Revenue, 1768-75 (part
of v. 32); Proceedings of the Provincial Court, 1637-70 (5 v. ); Pro-
ceedings of the Court of Chancery, 1669-79 (1 v. ); Proceedings of the
County Courts of Charles, Kent, Talbot, and Somerset Counties, 1648-76
(3 v. ); and nine volumes of Revolutionary records, civil and military,
1775-84. The earlier volumes show small textual errors and are without
adequate subject indexes, but more recent ones are free of these defects
and have also detailed introductions.

Supplementary to this series is Proceedings of the Maryland Court of
Appeals, 1695-1729, Carroll Taney Bond, ed. (" American Legal Records, "
I, Washington, 1933), which embraces the first of two volumes of Court
of Appeals Proceedings at the Hall of Records. " Commission Book, No.
82 [1733-50 and 1761-73] " in Md. Hist. Mag., XXVI (1931) and
XXVII (1932) is a record of appointments to office. There are numerous
early collections of Maryland laws, all of which are now quite scarce.
Five of these, dated respectively 1727, 1765, 1787, 1799-1800, and 1811,
were published at Annapolis; a sixth appeared in 1759 at Philadelphia.

Several groups of documents at the Hall of Records proper remain in
manuscript. The other book of Court of Appeals Proceedings covers the
period 1749 through 1760. The Provincial Court Judgements, 1679-1774