The "Eighteenth-Century Manuscripts" collection provides a wealth of source material on a range of major writers. John Forster owned the largest collection of Samuel Richardson manuscripts in existence. Forty-seven poems, including odes, sonnets, dramatic prologues and epilogues are included, along with the major archive of his correspondence. Eight-hundred and fifty letters are reproduced, many relating to his work on the major novels "Pamela," "Clarissa" and "Sir Charles Grandison." A vast collection of literary manuscripts, letters and papers of Jonathan Swift are also included in Part Two. Among them is Swift's private diary, that dates from 1727, many personal accounts, correspondence, verses, riddles, a problematic first edition of "Gulliver's Travels" with manuscript alterations that may be autograph and the Dublin Inquisition's Commission of Lunacy on Swift of 1742. Manuscripts of Samuel Johnson include the proof sheets of his "Lives of the English Poets," along with varied correspondence. Correspondence of major authors of the period include that of Daniel Defoe, Henry Fielding, Mrs. (Elizabeth) Inchbald, Robert Burns, Edmund Burke, William Cowper, Horace Walpole and David Hume. Some early letters of William Wordsworth date from 1797 and there is a large volume of verse by James Thomson.
