This study of a previously unpublished manuscript is a significant witness to the vigorous life of St Davids Cathedral, as well as to the changes to its fabric, especially in the restoration and recovery of the building after the depredations of the 1640s. Highlighting the beginnings of a process that culminated in Scott's restoration of 1865–73, the author focuses on a period illuminated by the eighteenth-century antiquarian Richard Davies's selection and collection of manuscript evidence relating both to the fabric and the personalities involved with the cathedral – such as Bishop Thomas Watson, whose removal from office carried national and political implications.