Sir
Oxford 23 April 1777
I was favoured with your Letter last night on my Return here. I am sorry that I did not happen to be in the way
when it arrived to return you an immediate Answer.
The Paper which Mr Barrington put into your Hands is an
Extract out of a MS of Mr J Price Bodley
Librarian, and you have his hearty concurrence to make what use you please of it. I claim no Property in it, neither have
I any Intention of making any further Use of it, it is therefore entirely at your Service. Mr Morris
of the Navy Office informs me that it was published last Century by John Rhydderch in his
Welch Grammar
.Jones may be referring to the classification of the letters
('Dosparthiad y Llythrennau') associated with the name of Edern (or Edeyrn) Dafod Aur, a copy of which was included in the Red Book of Hergest at the
Bodleian Library. See Roderick, Grammadeg Cymraeg (1728), pp. 39–46; and John Morris Jones, ‘Dosbarth Edern Dafod Aur’, THSC (1923–4), 1–28.
The claim that Roderick's
Grammar had been published
in the previous century is clearly erroneous. I beg you will accept of my sincere thanks for the Assistance which you so obligingly offer me. I have
nothing simlar to your Plan in View and therefore I will at all Times give you any Information in my Power with the greatest Pleasure. My Leisure
Hours are chiefly employed about a
MS of old British Musick
belonging to Mr Morris above mentioned which
Mr Barrington very obligingly has been at the Pains to procure me the use of, for sometime. As it is written in a manner
which seems to be peculiar to the Britains the Decyphering of it is attended with no small Difficulty. If any thing relative to that Subject falls
in your way, I shall take it as a particular Favour, if you will be so obliging as to communicate it to me.
I have sent you a specimen of the Musick in the MS. on the opposite Page that in Case you meet with any thing similar to it, it may not escape your Notice.
Mr Price desires his best Respects to you. Mr Fletcher
gives him great Hopes that the Drawings sent to Mr Rivington will be recovered. I wish you
all possible Success in your Undertaking and am with great Esteem
Sir
your most obliged humble Servant
John Jones