The Abbeville press and banner. [volume] (Abbeville, S.C.) 1869-1924, 1880-03-10
A Thousand. Year.Old Bible.

It was in 1850, writes correspondent
of the Rochester ErpresS, that l met, in
Mobile, Ala, the owner of this book
DR.. J. R. Witherspoon, grandson of
President Witherspoon, one of the sign
ers of the Declaration of Independence.
The doctor was an educated gentleman,
and urged me, if I ever came in The re-;
gion Of Greensboro, Ala, to be sure and
call on him and he wopid show me his
wonderful Bible. Twas not slow to ac-
cept his invitation, and rode on horse
back some dozen miles out Of my way to
see the greatest wonder of the age, of
this kind Of book. 49,.
found the venerable doctor living
elegantly on broad acres, and with his
slaves about him. The book was soon
brought out from careful keeping, and
sure enough. though I had seen for years
the great Van-Ess library, with Bibles
having d chain attached that once held
them to pulpit, and the Bibleof Philip
Melancthon with his autograph, / had
never seen any such Bible as this -.
took it in my hand with awe, for it
was written in the days Of King Alfred.
and by monk of Cornwall, England,
who worked at it forty years-a!most a
lifetime-and was evidently on the very
finest of parchment, little inferior to
satin. How such a finish could be put
upon the skin of any beast in the days SO
long ago, when the binding of the book
was in oak boards, tied with buckskin
thongs, was mystery and almost a
contradiction. >,
But more wonderful yet was the writ.
ing, within. The pages were all ruled
with accuracy aud written as uniformly
in the lines as print, which was not then
invented, for some five hundred years lay
between that old monk and Faust and
Gutenberg. The style was German
text hand, and was an. abbreviation
from the Latin Vulgate of jerome, made
in the fourth century. 81
The first chapter Of every book was
written with large capital Of inimlta-
kble beauty, and splendidly Illuminated
with red, blue and black ink, still in
vivid letters, with no two of the capital
etters precisely alike. Here was in
deed a Dore before him of our age.
Each chapter is divided into verses by
q dot of red ink, though / do not remem-
Der when "the venerable Bede" made
his division of the Scriptures into chap
ters and verses. This dot of the Bible l
speak Of may have been the work of q
subsequent age.
This manuscript Bible of Wither-
spoons contained all the books Of the
Old Testament except the Psalms and
the Apocrypha. Two chapters, the last
of Leviticus and the first of Numbers,
containing the most splendid capital let
ters in the book, had been recently wan
tonly abstracted or cut out, in the house
of DR.. Witherspoon, by some biblio-
maniac, who did not dare steal the
whole book. 1t contains also the whole
of the New Testament, except the chap
ter, where the disputed text occurs,
about "the three who bear record in
heaven"
In regard to the history of this Bible,
the doctor told me that it was found by
a friend of his father among a lot OF old
books bought at auction for q song
soma twenty shillings-and taken to q
clergyman, Rev. DR.. McCalla, of South
Carolina, as book that the purchaser
could not make head or tail of, and
which might be of value to some book
learned man. The clergyman readily
gave him some half a dozen books for it
from his library, such as could be easily
"understanded by the people," and the
man was happy in the exchange; DR..
McCalla certainly was, for he had driven
a sharp bargain and had a book that
was worth, when first written. S9,5O0,
and would be worth that now to any old
book-worm.