CHAPTER XI

PRICES OF VARIOUS CLASSES OF BOOKS 241

INDEX 265

PRICES OF BOOKS

CHAPTER I

INTRODUCTION

The treatment of such a subject as the Prices of Books necessarily

obliges us to range over a wide field, for books have been bought and

sold far back in the historical period, and to books, both manuscript

and printed, we have to refer largely for records of the past. It is,

however, only possible in the space at our disposal to take a very

general view of the subject; and it is to be hoped that, in recording

the main points in the vicissitudes of prices, the information may not

be deemed too desultory to be serviceable.

We might go back to the earliest times, even to Job’s famous

exclamation, but for our present purpose there would not be much

advantage in roaming in this early period, as the results to be recorded

would partake more of an archæological, than of a practical character.

There is very little chance of a copy of the first book of Martial’s

Epigrams (which, when first composed by the author, cost at Rome about

three shillings and sixpence of our money) coming to auction, so that

we are not likely to be able to record its present value.

A consideration of the subject opens up a large number of interesting

subjects, which can only casually be alluded to, such as the position of

authors, and their remuneration.

For several centuries monasteries were the chief producers of

literature, and it seems probable that it was worth the while of the

chiefs of some of these literary manufactories to pay a poet such as

Chaucer something for a new Canterbury Tale, which they could copy and

distribute over the country. We know by the number of manuscripts, and

the different order in these, that several establishments were employed

in the production of the manuscripts, and we may guess that there would

probably be competition among them, which would naturally result in a

settlement of some terms of payment.

In the early times it was only rich men who could afford to collect

books. Amongst these, one of the most distinguished was Richard de Bury,

Bishop of Durham, Treasurer and Chancellor of Edward III., who collected

everything, and spared no cost in the maintenance of a staff of copyists

and illuminators in his own household. Not only was he a collector

(whose books, however, have been dispersed), but he was the author of an

interesting relic of that devotion to an ennobling pursuit, the famous

_Philobiblon_. This book had never been satisfactorily produced until

the late Mr. Ernest Thomas issued in 1888 an admirable edition, founded

on a collation of many manuscripts, and a spirited translation.[1] This

work occupied Mr. Thomas several years, and before he completed it he

saw reason to doubt the high literary position which had been

universally accorded to the author; and his opinion was confirmed by an

unpublished passage in a manuscript of the _Chronicon sui temporis_ of

Adam de Murimuth, to which he was referred by Sir Edward Maunde

Thompson, where Adam characterised the bishop in very harsh terms. Mr.

Thomas published in “The Library” (vol. i. p. 335) an article entitled,

“Was Richard de Bury an Impostor?” In this he expressed the opinion that

Richard Aungerville--

(1) Was _not_ an excellent bishop, _but_ an ambitious self-seeker,

who bought his way to preferment.

(2) Was _not_ a scholar and patron of scholars, _but_ merely a

collector of books, that he might appear as a scholar.

(3) _Did not_ bestow his collections on Durham College, Oxford, as

he expressed his intention of doing; _but_ that these collections

were sold to pay debts incurred by his ostentatious extravagance.

(4) _Did not_ write _Philobiblon_. The authorship was claimed for

Robert Holkot, a Dominican, who for some time was a member of the

bishop’s household.

It is certain that the evidence is such as to force us to lower our

estimate of the prelate’s merits, but these four charges are certainly

not all proved. He may not have been so learned and so unselfish a lover

of books as was supposed, but there is no satisfactory reason for

depriving him of the credit of being the author of the _Philobiblon_.

Mr. Thomas shows that Richard de Bury was born on 24th January 1287, and

not 1281, as stated in the “Dictionary of National Biography.” He

completed the _Philobiblon_, and on the 14th April of the same year

_Dominus Ricardus de Bury migravit ad Dominum_.

A singularly appropriate chapter from the earliest “book about books”

may here be quoted:--

“WHAT WE ARE TO THINK OF THE PRICE IN THE BUYING OF BOOKS.

(Chapter III. of the _Philobiblon_ of Richard de Bury.[2])

“From what has been said we draw this corollary, welcome to us, but

(as we believe) acceptable to few; namely, that no dearness of price

ought to hinder a man from the buying of books, if he has the money

that is demanded for them, unless it be to withstand the malice of

the seller, or to await a more favourable opportunity of buying. For

if it is wisdom only that makes the price of books, which is an

infinite treasure to mankind, and if the value of books is

unspeakable, as the premises show, how shall the bargain be shown to

be dear where an infinite good is being bought? Wherefore that

books are to be gladly bought and unwillingly sold, Solomon, the sun

of men, exhorts in the _Proverbs_: _Buy the truth_, he says, _and

sell not wisdom_. But what we are trying to show by rhetoric or

logic, let us prove by examples from history. The arch-philosopher

Aristotle, whom Averroes regards as the law of Nature, bought a few

books of Speusippus straightway after his death for seventy-two

thousand sesterces. Plato, before him in time, but after him in

learning, bought the book of Philolaus the Pythagorean, from which

he is said to have taken the _Timæus_, for ten thousand denaries, as

Aulus Gellius relates in the _Noctes Atticæ_. Now Aulus Gellius

relates this that the foolish may consider how wise men despise

money in comparison with books. And on the other hand, that we may

know that folly and pride go together, let us here relate the folly

of Tarquin the Proud in despising books, as also related by Aulus

Gellius. An old woman, utterly unknown, is said to have come to

Tarquin the Proud, the seventh King of Rome, offering to sell nine

books in which (as she declared) sacred oracles were contained; but

she asked an immense sum for them, insomuch that the king said she

was mad. In anger she flung three books into the fire, and still

asked the same price for the rest. When the king refused it, again

she flung three others into the fire, and still asked the same price

for the three that were left. At last, astonished beyond measure,

Tarquin was glad to pay for three books the same price for which he

might have bought nine. The old woman straightway disappeared, and

was never seen before or after. These were the Sibylline books....”

The destruction of libraries, which was common in the Middle Ages,

naturally caused an increase in the value of those which remained. How

completely these libraries passed away may be seen by the instance of

that which was once preserved in St. Paul’s Cathedral, and is noticed by

the late Dr. Sparrow Simpson in his “St. Paul’s Cathedral Library”

(1893). Walter Shiryngton Clerk founded the library, the catalogue of

which (1458) fills eight folio pages in the first edition of Dugdale’s

“History of St. Paul’s.” Of all the manuscripts in this catalogue, only

three are now known to exist: one is still at St. Paul’s, the second is

at Aberdeen, and the third at Lambeth.

The British Museum is fortunate in possessing the beautiful library of

the Kings and Queens of England since Henry VII., which is full of the

most splendid specimens of artistic bindings. What the market value of

such literary gems as these may be can scarcely be estimated, and

fortunately they are safe from the arising of any occasion which might

afford a test of their value. From this library we are able to

appreciate the good taste of James I., who, whatever his faults may have

been, was certainly a true bibliophile, and to him we owe some of the

finest books in the collection.

It may be safely said that few collections of books have been formed

under such difficult and trying circumstances as the invaluable Thomason

Collection of Civil War Tracts, now happily preserved in the British

Museum. Mr. F. Madan has contributed to _Bibliographica_ (vol. iii. p.

291) a most valuable article on the labours of the worthy Royalist

bookseller, George Thomason. Thomason commenced in November 1640, when

the “Long or Rebel Parliament” began, his great undertaking of

collecting all the pamphlets published in England, and he continued it

until May 1661. Many of these were printed surreptitiously, and were

obtained with the greatest difficulty; in fact, seventy-three of these

were in manuscript, “which no man durst then venture to publish without

endangering his ruine.” The King and the Cavalier party knew of the

existence of the collection, but every endeavour was made to keep the

knowledge from the other party. If it were difficult to form the

collection, it was still more difficult to preserve it. We are told

that, “to prevent the discovery of them, when the army was Northwards,

he packed them in several trunks, and, by one or two in a week, sent

them to a trusty friend in Surrey, who safely preserved them, and when

the army was Westward, and fearing their return that way, they were sent

to London again; but the collector durst not keep them, but sent them

into Essex, and so according as they lay near danger, still by timely

removing them at a great charge, secured them, but continued perfecting

the work.” Afterwards, for greater security, they were lodged in the

Bodleian Library, and a pretended bargain was made, and a receipt for

£1000 given to the University of Oxford, so that “if the Usurper had

found them out the University should claim them, who had greater power

to struggle for them than a private man.”

On one occasion Charles I. wished to consult a particular pamphlet, and

applied to Thomason for the loan of it. In small quarto vol. 100 is a

manuscript note describing the particulars of this interesting loan:--

“Memorandum that Col. Will Legg and Mr. Arthur Treavors were

employed by his M?tie K. Charles to gett for his present use, a

pamphlet which his M?tie had then occasion to make use of, and not

meeting with it, they both came to me, having heard that I did

employ my selfe to take up all such things, from the beginning of

that Parlement, and finding it with me, tould me it was for the

King’s owne use, I tould them all I had were at his M?ties command

and service, and withall tould them if I should part with it and

loose it, presuming that when his M?tie had done with it, that

little account would be made of it, and so I should loose by that

losse a limbe of my collection, which I should be very loth to do,

well knowing it would be impossible to supplie it if it should

happen to be lost, with which answer they returned to his M?tie at

Hampton Court (as I take it) and tould him they had found that peece

he so much desired and withall how loath he that had it, was to part

with, he much fearing its losse; whereupon they were both sent to me

againe by his M?tie to tell me that upon the worde of a Kinge (to

use their own expressions) he would safely returne it, thereuppon

immediately by them I sent it to his M?tie, who having done with it,

and having it with him when he was going towards the Isle of Wight,

let it fall in the durt, and then callinge for the two persons

before mentioned (who attended him) delivered it to them, with a

charge, as they would answer it another day, that they should both

speedily and safely return it to him, from whom they had received

it, and withall to desire the partie to goe on and continue what had

begun, which book together with his M?ties signification to me by

these worthy and faithfull gentlemen I received both speedily and

safely. Which volume hath the marke of honor upon it, which no

other volume in my collection hath, and very diligently and

carefully I continued the same, until the most hapie restoration and

coronation of his most gratious m?tie Kinge Charles the second whom

God long preserve.--GEORGE THOMASON.”

Here we have surely an interesting instance of the poetry of

bibliography.

According to Mr. Madan’s calculation, there are 22,834 pamphlets in

about 1983 volumes, and apparently some hundred or so pieces have been

lost from the original set. The collection of these pamphlets was made

at very considerable expense, and Thomason is said to have refused £4000

for them, “supposing that sum not sufficient to reimburse him.” On his

death in 1666 a special trust was appointed under his will to take

charge of the collection, and Dr. Thomas Barlow (Bodley’s librarian,

1652 to 1660) was one of the trustees. In 1675 Barlow was appointed

Bishop of Lincoln, and in the following year requested the Rev. George

Thomason (son of the bookseller) to take over the charge. After many

vicissitudes the books were bought for the absurdly small sum of £300

for George III., who presented the collection to the British Museum. It

is impossible to guess at the present price of what is practically

invaluable.

The famous antiquary Elias Ashmole, whose treasures are now preserved at

Oxford in the Ashmolean Museum, records in his Diary some of his

purchases, as, on May 1667, “I bought Mr. John Booker’s study of books,

and gave £140 for them”; and again, on June 12, 1681, “I bought Mr.

Lilly’s library of books of his widow for £50.”[3] We can judge of the

character of his library by these purchases of the collections of two of

his famous astrological friends.

Even in the seventeenth century men began to be frightened at the

increase of books, and Sir Thomas Browne in his _Religio Medici_

suggested a system of destruction: “’Tis not a melancholy _utinam_ of my

own, but the desires of better heads, that there were a general

synod--not to unite the incompatible difference of religion, but--for

the benefit of learning, to reduce it, as it lay at first, in a few and

solid authors; and to condemn to the fire those swarms and millions of

rhapsodies, begotten only to distract and abuse the weaker judgments of

scholars, and to maintain the trade and mystery of typographers.” If

there was reason for this complaint two centuries ago, how much more

must there be now! but the project is unworkable, and Time takes the

matter in his own hand and destroys. Fortunately the destruction chiefly

takes place among books not likely to be missed.

Three of the greatest book collectors of the eighteenth century were

Bishop Moore, the Earl of Sunderland, and the Earl of Oxford. Bishop

Moore’s fine library, which consisted of about thirty thousand volumes,

was offered in 1714 to Harley, Earl of Oxford, for £8000, but the latter

did not accept the offer because the bishop insisted that the earl

should pay the money at once, although he was not to receive the books

till the collector’s death. He would not really have had long to wait,

for the bishop died on July 31st of the same year. The library, mainly

through the influence of Lord Townshend, was purchased for £6000 by

George I., who presented it to the University of Cambridge. This

presentation gave rise to two well-known epigrams, which have been

frequently misquoted. Dr. Trapp, the first Professor of Poetry at

Oxford, expressed the disgust of his University in these lines--

“Contrary methods justly George applies

To govern his two Universities;

To Oxford sent a troop of horse; for why?

That learned body wanted Loyalty.

To Cambridge he sent books, as well discerning

How much that loyal body wanted learning.”

Sir William Browne, the physician, put the Cambridge case in a form

which extorted praise from the Oxonian Samuel Johnson--

“Contrary methods justly George applies

To govern his two Universities;

And so to Oxford sent a troop of horse,

For Tories hold no argument but force.

To Cambridge Ely’s learned troops are sent,

For Whigs admit no force but argument.”[4]

When Lord Treasurer Harley recommended Queen Anne to purchase Sir

Symonds d’Ewes’ manuscripts as the richest collection in England after

Sir Robert Cotton’s, and to present them to a public library, the Queen

answered, “It was no virtue for her, a woman, to prefer, as she did,

arts to arms; but while the blood and honour of a nation were at stake

in her wars, she could not, till she had secured her _living_ subjects

an honourable peace, bestow their money upon _dead_ letters.” Thereupon

the Lord Treasurer bought the collection himself for £6000.[5] The whole

collection of the Harleian MSS. (one of the greatest treasures of the

British Museum Library), which consists of 7639 volumes, exclusive of

14,236 original rolls, charters, deeds, and other legal instruments, was

purchased by Government for £10,000, or only £4000 more than the Earl of

Oxford gave for Sir Symonds d’Ewes’ manuscripts alone.

The Earl of Sunderland’s fine library was for several years housed in

the mansion which formerly stood on the site of the Albany in

Piccadilly. It was removed to Blenheim in 1749, where it remained till

the great sale of 1881-83. Oldys reports that the King of Denmark

offered Lord Sunderland’s heirs £30,000 for the library,[6] and that the

great Duchess Sarah of Marlborough was in favour of the offer being

accepted, but it was not.

We learn from Hearne’s “Remains” that £3000 was offered by the

University of Oxford for the noble library of Isaac Vossius, the

free-thinking Canon of Windsor, and refused. Hearne adds, “We should

have purchased them, and not stood in such a case upon punctilio and

niceties, when we are so lavish of our money upon trifles that bring

dishonour on the University.” The library was taken abroad, and soon

afterwards sold to the University of Leyden for the same amount as that

previously offered by Oxford (£3000).[7]

Thomas Osborne, the chief bookseller of his time, bought the great

Harley library, consisting of about 50,000 volumes of printed books,

41,000 prints, and about 350,000 pamphlets, for £13,000. This seems a

small amount for so matchless a collection, but it is not certain that

Osborne made a very profitable investment by his purchase. We shall have

more to say of the bookseller and the library in the next chapter.

As an instance of the low price of books at this time, the anecdote of

Mr. David Papillon’s agreement with Osborne may be mentioned here. The

contract was that the bookseller should supply Mr. Papillon (who died in

1762) with one hundred pounds’ worth of books at threepence apiece, the

only conditions being that they should be perfect, and that there should

be no duplicates. Osborne was at first pleased with his bargain, and

sent in a large number of books; but he soon found that it would be

impossible to carry out the agreement without great loss, as he was

obliged to send in books worth shillings instead of pence. Long before

he had supplied the eight thousand volumes required, he begged to be let

off the contract.

Things were worse in Russia, where Klostermann, the bookseller to the

Imperial Court, sold books by the yard (fifty to one hundred roubles,

according to binding). Every courtier who had hopes of a visit from the

Empress Catharine was expected to have a library, and as few of them had

any literary taste, they bought them at this rate. Sometimes waste-paper

books were lettered with the names of celebrated authors.

Authorship could hardly become a profession until after the invention of

printing, and even then it was long before a living could be got out of

books. Dr. Edward Castell laboured for seventeen years in the

compilation of his immense undertaking--the _Lexicon Heptaglotton_, to

accompany Walton’s Polyglot Bible. During this time he maintained at his

own cost as writers seven Englishmen and as many foreigners. All of them

died before the work was completed. Besides expending £12,000 of his own

money he was obliged to borrow £2000 more, and this not being

sufficient, he petitioned Charles II. that a prison might not be the

reward of so much labour. Notwithstanding a circular letter from the

king recommending the purchase of this work the author ended his days in

poverty, and a great part of the impression was thrown into garrets,

where many of the copies were destroyed by damp or rats.

A similar case was that of Thomas Madox, the learned author of the

“History of the Exchequer,” who wrote to Dr. Charlett requesting him to

get his book into the College Libraries at Oxford, and explaining that

the cost of the impression was £400 for paper and print, and as only 481

copies were printed, “when all the books shall be sold I shall be just

able to pay the charges with a trifling over-plus.... This affair,” he

adds, “has given me much perplexity, and perfectly cured me of

scribbling.”[8]

Thomas Hearne was more fortunate, and amassed a small fortune by his

publications. One thousand guineas were found in gold in his rooms at

St. Edmund Hall after his death. His books were soon out of print, and

fetched large prices even in his own lifetime.

Lord Spencer bought the whole of the library of Count Revickzky, a

catalogue of which had been privately printed by the original owner at

Berlin in 1784. According to Dibdin, when the Count was in England he

offered his whole collection to Lord Spencer for a certain round sum to

be paid to him immediately, and for a yearly sum by way of annuity. The

offer was accepted, and as the Count died soon afterwards, Lord Spencer

obtained the library at a cheap rate. The same noble collector offered

the Duke di Cassano Serra £500 for two books, viz., the _Juvenal_ of

Ulric Han, and the _Horace_ of Arnaldus de Bruxella, Naples, 1474, but

the offer was not accepted. In 1820 Lord Spencer bought the whole

collection.

The Duke of Devonshire purchased the valuable library of Dr. Thomas

Dampier, Bishop of Ely, for nearly £10,000 after the bishop’s death in

1812. Dr. Dibdin has printed in his “Reminiscences” (vol. i. p. 363) a

list of prices at which Dr. Dampier valued the various classes of books

in his library.

Little idea of the prices of books can be obtained from the amounts

given for a whole library, but as in future chapters particulars will be

printed of the great libraries that have been disposed of by auction, it

seemed well to mention here a few instances of libraries that have been

sold entire. The greatest of these is the magnificent library of Earl

Spencer, which was sold in 1892 to Mrs. Rylands, and has been

transferred from Althorpe to Manchester. The exact amount paid for this

library has not been announced, but it is supposed to have been about a

quarter of a million pounds.

In respect to the history of prices of books, there have been times of

inflation and times of depression, just as in the history of prices

generally, but it will be seen that in spite of these vicissitudes

scarce books have gradually increased in value. The first signs of the

growth of _bibliomania_ are seen in the sales of Dr. Mead’s and Dr.

Askew’s libraries in the middle of the last century, which aroused a

great interest among book collectors.

During the great Napoleonic wars books became very scarce, because

Englishmen were prevented from purchasing on the Continent, but upon

the conclusion of the peace there was a steady flow of books into the

country.

The Duke of Roxburghe’s sale in 1812 was a great event, forming, as it

did, an epoch in the history of book collecting, and the widespread

fervour of bibliomaniacs may be dated from that period. Great sales

followed, and then came the sale of the enormous Heber library, which

let out too many books on the market at once. After this there followed

a dull time, but a revival came with the Bright sale in 1846 and Stowe

sale in 1849, and the Daniel and Corser sales between 1860 and 1870, and

the Henry Perkins sale in 1873, were great events. The last few years

have been marked by many great sales, those of the Sunderland, the

Beckford, and Hamilton Libraries, and the Turner, Gaisford, Crawford,

and Ashburnham collections being among the most remarkable. The greatly

increased prices obtained for books have induced many proprietors to

sell their literary treasures.

It is well to remember that the value of all books is not rising, but

that whole classes have fallen in price. Greek and Roman Classics, and

the Fathers and Theological Literature generally, have been most

markedly depreciated in value.

Fashion guides alterations in the prices of books, just as she does in

other less important matters. Thus we find at one time certain books

quoted at high prices, which not many years afterwards have become drugs

in the market. Still, a careful review of the subject will show that

fashion is not nearly so potent as in some other departments, say, for

instance, in the case of pictures, which certainly vary in price more

than books. In spite, therefore, of signs of variableness, it will be

seen that there is a continuous increase of price among certain classes

of books which are sure to retain their value, and even to be still more

esteemed as time passes.

It may be well to inquire what are some of the causes which lead to an

increase in the price, and to distinguish between those which are

permanent and those which are ephemeral. The growth of book-collecting

in the United States has had a most potent influence, and large

purchases made for many years in England have drained off a large number

of books, low priced as well as high priced, which will never return to

this country. Another cause is the increase of public libraries in Great

Britain, and when books are bought for these libraries they are

permanently removed from the open market, as they are not when sold to

an individual, because his library will most probably eventually come to

the hammer. These two causes would be sufficient in themselves to

permanently increase the price of scarce books, but there are still

others to be mentioned. There has been of late years a greatly increased

interest felt in the history of books--in printing, in binding--and

increased knowledge has shown the great claims of a large number of

books to a higher appreciation than hitherto. Then again, the class of

the wealthy who can afford to collect choice libraries has largely

increased; and lastly, the belief that the collecting of books is by no

means a bad investment has not been without effect. This last point

opens up a very interesting question in ethics, Should a collector look

upon his collections as an investment? The late Mr. J. Hill Burton

argues very strongly against this view in his “Book-Hunter.” He writes--

“The mercenary spirit must not be admitted to a share in the

enjoyments of the book-hunter.... If [he] allows money-making, even

for those he is to leave behind, to be combined with his pursuit, it

loses its fresh relish, its exhilarating influence, and becomes the

source of wretched cares and paltry anxieties. When money is the

object, let a man speculate or become a miser.”...

This is quite true, but we must remember that, after all, increased

price is only an outward manifestation of increased public estimation,

and it is always satisfactory to know that our opinion has been accepted

by the public. The real point seems to be that the collector should use

his judgment in respect to price, and not trouble himself whether the

market value of individual books goes up or down, for he may be sure

that if he buys wisely, the ups and the downs will balance each other.

If a fair-sized library is purchased with judgment and knowledge, it

cannot fail to become a profitable investment, because good books

increase in value by reason of their companionship. All worthless books

should therefore be ruthlessly weeded out. For instance, a library of

1000 choice books would probably sell for less with 500 books of little

value added to them than if these were ruthlessly eliminated.

Mr. Andrew Lang writes in his pretty little book, “The Library”--

“When Osborne sold the Harley collection, the scarcest old English

books fetched but three or four shillings. If the Wandering Jew had

been a collector in the last century, he might have turned a pretty

profit by selling his old English books in this age.”

But Mr. Lang did not think of a calculation, by which Mr. A. W. Pollard,

in an interesting article on “English Booksales, 1676-86”

(_Bibliographica_, vol. ii. p. 126), overthrew this view of the

possibility of great gains. He writes--

“It is perhaps in accordance with precedent to remark that, by the

judicious expenditure of five-and-twenty pounds during the ten years

we have reviewed, a library of about two hundred volumes might have

been acquired, which would now be cheap at £10,000. But as the £25,

if invested at compound interest at five per cent., would now have

amounted to nearly a million, it is well for bookmen not to make too

much of such mercenary considerations.”

This question of price was formerly a delicate one. Thus William Beloe

was censured by some collectors for drawing attention to the subject in

his “Anecdotes of Literature”; but that this objection is got over now

may be seen from the great success of such a valuable annual as the

“Book-Prices Current,” notwithstanding the complaints of some

second-hand booksellers of injury to their business from its revelation

of the real value of their books!

Dibdin mentions a book-collector to whom he was pointed out at the

Roxburghe sale, who exclaimed, “Hang him! why did he not publish his

book in 1810? My books would have brought double the prices.”[9]

Dibdin doubtless influenced the market; and in later times two men have

exerted a very special influence in raising the prices of books: these

are the late Mr. Henry Stevens and Mr. Bernard Quaritch. The former drew

his countrymen’s attention to early books printed in and relating to

America, and he caused a considerable increase in the price of

Americana. But neither of these great book-buyers could have permanently

raised the price of books if they had not devoted their attention to

books which were well worth these advanced prices. When we deal with

books of great beauty and value, and of rare occurrence, which are

wanted by several rich book-collectors, it is difficult to say what

price is too great for such treasures.

It becomes, therefore, an important matter for the book-collector to

consider what are the rules that guide the enhancement of price in

books. It is not easy to codify these rules, for varying circumstances

alter cases: thus new editions reduce the value of some high-priced

books, but have no effect in the case of others; and time supersedes

some books, while it enhances the value of others. There are, however,

one or two points which may be mentioned as regulating price, for those

persons who suppose prices to be altogether erratic are certainly wrong.

What, then, are the chief characteristics of a book which make it

valuable? “Uniquity,” to use Horace Walpole’s word, is one of these;

but this is not always sufficient to keep up the price.

Good condition is the grand enhancer of value, and dirty copies of even

scarce works are seldom worth much. But nowadays much is done by the

artist to improve these books. The leaves can be washed, torn pages can

be mended, imperfections can be filled up by fac-similes, and then the

whole can be handsomely bound in morocco, so that the owner scarcely

knows his book again. Still, however, one difficulty remains in the

artistic make-up--a short copy cannot be made into a tall one.

It is useless for the artist to spend his labour upon other than the

best books, such as the productions of the early presses, original

editions of masterpieces, and works of permanent value in their best

possible form, with the authors’ final corrections. The only high-priced

books which can dispense with interesting contents are specimens of fine

bindings; while here again, if the historical binding covers a really

valuable book, the two elements of value united will cause a remarkable

enhancement of price.

Little need be said as to those books which fetch high prices for a

time, and then when fashion alters sink to a much lower level, as it

will usually be found that there was no intrinsic value attached to

these books, and therefore they were not such as would be bought by the

wise collector at a high price. The fictitious value has usually been

attained by a system of limited editions and of judicious advertising.

Success in these cases is attained among a class outside the experts in

bibliography, and therefore there is no cause for wonder that mistakes

are made. Sometimes the depression is caused by the unexpected

appearance of several copies of a book, of which one or two copies only

were believed to exist.

In considering the probability of high prices being sustained, it must

always be borne in mind that the peaceful and prosperous condition of

the country is taken for granted. In times of national calamity little

money is available for luxuries. Two other important points must be

remembered. (1) That it is of no use for a book to be scarce if nobody

wants it. The money value of the phenomenally dull book mentioned by Sir

Walter Scott is not recorded.

“We have heard of one work of fiction so unutterably stupid that the

proprietor, diverted by the rarity of the incident, offered the

book, which consisted of two volumes duodecimo, handsomely bound, to

any person who would declare upon his honour that he had read the

whole from beginning to end. But although this offer was made to the

passengers on board an Indiaman during a tedious outward-bound

voyage, the “Memoirs of Clegg the Clergyman” (such was the title of

this unhappy composition) completely baffled the most dull and

determined student on board, when the love of glory prevailed with

the boatswain, a man of strong and solid parts, to hazard the

attempt, and he actually conquered and carried off the prize.”

(2) That good books are still very cheap, particularly those which it is

necessary to possess. So much is talked about the high prices which

books fetch, that many are led to believe that he must be a rich man who

commences to collect a library; but this is not so, for many good books

in good condition can be bought for a few shillings; in fact, some of

the best library books, well bound, do not range at more than ten

shillings per octavo volume, and this cannot be called a high price.

Ordinary collectors must make up their minds to do without Mazarin

Bibles and first folios of Shakespeare, and they will find that life can

be lived without these expensive luxuries.

In conclusion, it is necessary to strike a note of warning respecting

the bad paper which is used for some books, and which render these books

quite worthless in a few years. Old books were made to last; the

materials used--paper and ink--were of the very best, but many books of

the present day are made of bad materials, and contain within them the

elements of decay. Lately a German Commission investigated this subject,

and for their purpose took out from the Berlin Library one hundred

volumes. They classified the paper upon which these books were printed

under the four headings of (1) good; (2) medium; (3) bad; (4) very bad.

About five books came under the first two classes, and the remainder

were about equally divided between the third and fourth classes. Can we

with any confidence claim a better average for English books? If not,

the future of our modern books is a dark one.

FOOTNOTES:

[1] A still more elaborate edition was published by the Grolier Club in

1889. This was edited by Professor A. F. West, and printed in three

volumes small quarto. It was issued in a small edition, and a sight of

it is therefore difficult to obtain.

[2] From Ernest C. Thomas’s translation, 1888.

[3] Dibdin’s _Bibliomania_, Part V.

[4] The versions given in Noble’s Continuation of Granger are inferior

to the above, which were taken from an old MS. by the Rev. Cecil Moore,

and are believed by him to be the originals. See “Bibliographer,” vol.

vi. p. 92.

[5] William Oldys’s “Choice Notes,” 1862, p. 38.

[6] Ibid. p. 92.

[7] Bliss’s _Reliquiæ Hearnianæ_, 1869, vol. i. pp. 206, 207.

[8] “Letters from the Bodleian,” vol. i. p. 214.

[9] Dibdin’s “Reminiscences,” vol. i. p. 356 (note).

CHAPTER II

SELLERS OF BOOKS

It has been frequently remarked that a history of bookselling would be a

valuable addition to our literature, but such a book would require

extensive research. In place of this a history of some booksellers has

been produced; but although the volumes of Mr. Curwen and Mr. Roberts

are interesting in themselves, they do not go far to fill the vacant

space still open for a history of bookselling. Mr. G. H. Putnam has

gathered together much curious information in his “Authors and their

Public in Ancient Times,” and “Books and their Makers during the Middle

Ages,” which, notwithstanding some errors, form certainly a useful

contribution towards this history. The sellers of books have greatly

changed their habits with the altered conditions of their trade. Among

the Greeks there were public shops for the sale of manuscripts, and in

them the learned met together to hear the manuscripts read. In Rome the

general mart for books was to be found in the district devoted to the

bibliopole, and in his shop advertisements of new works were stuck up.

At the break up of the Roman Empire the producers of books were mostly

found in the monasteries, and booksellers were sellers of Paternosters,

Aves, &c., as well as of books.

In the thirteenth century the _stationarii_ not only sold books, but

accumulated much money by lending them at high rates. Bookstalls were

sometimes placed in the church porch, and one of the doors of Rouen

Cathedral is still called _le portail des libraires_.

When manuscripts were superseded by printed books the business of

selling books naturally became a more important concern, although the

London company established by printers and publishers was called the

Company of Stationers. At first one man often undertook all the

varieties of book production and bookselling, but gradually the four

broad divisions of printers, publishers, second-hand booksellers, and

auctioneers came into existence.

We know but little of the early publishers, although much attention is

now being paid to the lives and works of the old book producers, and we

may hope to have in course of time much material for a history of them.

The great houses founded in the eighteenth and at the beginning of the

present century are still with us, and large additions have been made of

late years to the ever-increasing roll. At all events, there is no sign

of a failure of published books; whether they are all worthy to be

published is another matter.

Great changes have been made in the publishing business, and one of the

chief of these is the frequent sale of remainders of new books. It is

worth a remark in passing that good books which have been sold off often

become scarce and more valuable than those which have only been sold in

the ordinary way. James Lackington was one of the first to make a great

business out of the sale of remainders; he was followed by Tegg, and

these two men did much to cheapen and popularise literature.

Charles Knight will ever be remembered with honour as the great pioneer

in the cheapening of good literature. The excellence of his shilling

volumes was a marvel when they were first published, and even now it

would be difficult to find their equal. Knight had a great belief in the

adequacy of the penny as a price for a number of a book. He published

large quantities of books at a penny a number--as one of the first cheap

periodicals--the _Penny Magazine_, and the first of cheap

encyclopædias--the _Penny Cyclopædia_. How much good has been done by

the large issues of such excellent books as Knight’s weekly and monthly

volumes, the Libraries of Useful and Entertaining Knowledge, Constable’s

Miscellany, Murray’s Family Library, Home and Colonial Library, and

Bohn’s Libraries!--books all of which are worthy of a place in the

library, and not like too many of the cheap books of the present day,

books to be read and then thrown aside.

In taking note of some of the old second-hand booksellers, special

mention must be made of Joseph Kirton of St. Paul’s Churchyard, whose

sign was “The King’s Arms,” because he was Samuel Pepys’s

bookseller--“my poor Kirton,” as the latter calls him when he was ruined

by the Fire of London. Pepys tells us that “Kirton was utterly undone

by the loss of all his stock, so that from being worth seven or eight

thousand pounds, he was made two or three thousand pounds worse than

nothing.” (See “Diary,” October 5, 1666.) The poor bookseller did not

live long after his great loss, for he died in October 1667. Pepys

records an interesting instance of the rise in price of one of the books

burnt in the great fire. On March 20, 1666-67 he writes: “It is strange

how Rycaut’s ‘Discourse of Turky,’ which before the fire I was asked but

8s. for, there being all but twenty-two or thereabouts burned, I did now

offer 20s., and he demands 50s., and I think I shall give it him, though

it be only as a monument of the fire.” On April 8, 1667, he gives us

some fuller particulars, which are of interest: “So I away to the

Temple, to my new bookseller’s; and there I did agree for Rycaut’s late

‘History of the Turkish Policy,’ which costs me 55s.; whereas it was

sold plain before the late fire for 8s., and bound and coloured as this

for 20s., for I have bought it finely bound and truly coloured, all the

figures, of which there was but six books done so, whereof the King and

Duke of York, and Duke of Monmouth and Lord Arlington had four. The

fifth was sold, and I have bought the sixth.” There is no copy of this

edition in the British Museum.

John Dunton, the erratic bookseller and projector of the eighteenth

century, has left us in his “Life and Errors” a most curious account of

the booksellers of his time, who are all, oddly enough, either handsome

themselves or have beautiful wives. Nearly all are also eminent

Christians; in fact, we are told that of three hundred booksellers

trading in country towns the author knew not of one knave or blockhead

amongst them all.

Thomas Osborne, the most celebrated bookseller of his day, is

interesting to us as having had the honour of being knocked down by Dr.

Samuel Johnson. Whether or no he deserved such a summary punishment we

cannot now tell, but although he appears to have been more of a business

man than a literary character, what he did is sufficient to place him in

an honourable position in the history of English bibliography. He bought

the finest library of the time, and sold it piecemeal at reasonable

prices. He employed two of the most capable men of his day--Johnson and

Oldys--to make a Catalogue, which does credit to all concerned in its

production, and he did not make much money by the transaction. The

amount he gave for the Harley library in 1742 (£13,000) was less by

£5000 than the binding of a portion of the library had cost, but had he

given more he would certainly have been a loser. Osborne projected a

Catalogue, in which it was proposed “that the books shall be distributed

into distinct classes, and every class arranged with some regard to the

age of the writers; that every book shall be accurately described; that

the peculiarities of the editions shall be remarked, and observations

from the authors of literary history occasionally interspersed, that by

this Catalogue posterity may be informed of the excellence and value of

this great collection, and thus promote the knowledge of scarce books

and elegant editions.” Maittaire drew up the scheme of arrangement, and

wrote the Latin dedication to Lord Carteret, who was then Secretary of

State. Dr. Johnson wrote the “Proposals” for printing the _Bibliotheca

Harleiana_, which afterwards were prefixed to the first volume. But in

spite of having such eminent helpers, Osborne had to give up his project

of an annotated Catalogue, and he informed the public in the preface to

the third volume of his failure--

“My original design was, as I have already explained, to publish a

methodical and exact Catalogue of this library, upon the plan which

has been laid down, as I am informed, by several men of the first

rank among the learned. It was intended by those who undertook the

work, to make a very exact disposition of all the subjects, and to

give an account of the remarkable differences of the editions, and

other peculiarities, which make any book eminently valuable; and it

was imagined that some improvements might, by pursuing this scheme,

be made in Literary History. With this view was the Catalogue begun,

when the price [5s. per volume] was fixed upon it in public

advertisements; and it cannot be denied that such a Catalogue would

have been willingly purchased by those who understood its use. But

when a few sheets had been printed, it was discovered that the

scheme was impracticable without more hands than could be procured,

or more time than the necessity of a speedy sale would allow. The

Catalogue was therefore continued without notes, at least in the

greatest part; and though it was still performed better than those

which are daily offered to the public, fell much below the original

intention.”

The public were not very grateful for what they did receive, and

resented Osborne’s charge of five shillings a volume for the Catalogue,

which seems reasonable enough now, but was then denounced as “an

avaricious innovation.” In answer to the clamour the bookseller

announced that “those who have paid five shillings shall be allowed at

any time within three months after the day of sale either to return them

in exchange for books, or to send them back and receive their money.”

Another complaint was that the books were priced too high. As this was a

serious charge, Osborne got Johnson to put his answer into sonorous

language, that would at least make the complainers ashamed of

themselves: “If, therefore, I have set a high value upon books, if I

have vainly imagined literature to be more fashionable than it really

is, or idly hoped to revive a taste well-nigh extinguished, I know not

why I should be persecuted with clamour and invective, since I shall

only suffer by my mistake, and be obliged to keep those books which I

was in hopes of selling.”

Dibdin proves that this charge of over-pricing is quite unjust. He

writes: “Whoever inspects Osborne’s Catalogue of 1748 (four years after

the Harleian sale) will find in it many of the most valuable of Lord

Oxford’s books; and among them a copy of the Aldine Plato of 1513 struck

off upon vellum, marked at £21 only--for this identical copy Lord Oxford

gave 100 guineas, as Dr. Mead informed Dr. Askew; from the latter of

whose collections it was purchased by Dr. Hunter, and is now in the

Hunter Museum. There will be found in Osborne’s Catalogues of 1748 and

1753 some of the scarcest books in English literature marked at 2 or 3

or 4s. for which three times the number of _pounds_ is now given.”[10]

Dibdin has given a useful analysis of the contents of the Harleian

Library in his _Bibliomania_. Osborne published a large number of

catalogues full of literary curiosities, and with interesting notes and

prefaces. In Mr. Thorpe’s Catalogue of 1851 there is a notice of a set

of Osborne’s Catalogues from 1729 to 1768, in forty-three volumes

octavo. This famous bookseller died on 27th August 1767, and he is said

to have left behind him some forty thousand pounds.

No bookseller has ever been held in higher esteem than Thomas Payne, who

was honourably known as “honest Tom Payne.” Payne’s shop at the Mews

Gate, where the National Gallery now stands, was for years the great

afternoon resort of the chief book collectors. Here met such men as

Cracherode, George Steevens, Malone, Lord Spencer, Grenville, Bishop

Dampier, Towneley, and Colonel Stanley. Payne lived at the Mews Gate for

forty years, having commenced business as an assistant to his elder

brother, Oliver Payne. Thomas’s first catalogue, when he set up for

himself, is dated 1740. He removed to Pall Mall, and retired from

business in 1790. He died in 1799, at the age of eighty-two. He was

succeeded by his son, who, in partnership with Henry Foss, carried on a

first-rate bookselling business in Pall Mall for many years. The

catalogue of the Grenville Library was made and published by them.

George Nicol, styled by Beloe in his _Sexagenarian_ “a superb

bookseller,” was a man of great influence in his day. He was largely

instrumental in the purchase of much of two magnificent libraries--those

of George III. and the Duke of Roxburghe--and he was highly esteemed by

both his employers. He always spoke of the King as his beloved master.

It was he who induced R. H. Evans, the bookseller, to adopt the business

of an auctioneer by offering him the sale of the Roxburghe library.

Another bookseller who occupies a prominent position in the roll of

learned and high-principled members of the calling was Thomas Rodd, of

Great Newport Street. His catalogues were of great interest, and he

numbered among his customers most of the book-collectors of his time.

Lord Campbell referred to him in one of his books as “that very learned

and worthy bookseller, my friend Thomas Rodd.”

A rival of Rodd was Thomas Thorpe, who commenced business in Covent

Garden, removed to Piccadilly, and in his later days returned to Covent

Garden. Thorpe was a masterful man, who carried everything before him,

and published a series of valuable catalogues, from which may be

obtained a history of prices for many years. Dibdin, in his

“Reminiscences” (1806), says, “I know of no such dogged, indomitable

energy and perseverance as that of this renowned bibliopolist”; and

again, in the preface to his “Library Companion,” he writes, “Mr.

Thorpe is indeed a man of might. His achievements at book-sales are

occasionally described in the ensuing pages. It is his catalogues I am

here to treat. They are never-ceasing productions; thronged with

treasures which he has gallantly borne off at the point of his lance, in

many a hard day’s fight in the Pall Mall and Waterloo Place arenas. But

these conquests are no sooner obtained than the public receives an

account of them; and during the last year only, his catalogues in three

parts, now before me, comprise not fewer than seventeen thousand nine

hundred and fifty-nine articles. What a scale of buying and selling does

this fact alone evince! But in this present year two parts have already

appeared, containing upwards of twelve thousand articles. Nor is this

all. On the 24th day of September, in the year of our Lord 1823, there

appeared the most marvellous phenomenon ever witnessed in the annals of

bibliopolism. The _Times_ newspaper had four of the five columns of its

last page occupied by an advertisement of Mr. Thorpe, containing the

third part of his catalogue for that year. On a moderate computation

this advertisement comprised eleven hundred and twenty lines.” Greater

things have been done since.

The Bohns were mighty booksellers in their time--John the father, and

Henry and James the two sons; but Henry Bohn made the greatest name. His

famous Guinea Catalogue (“the guinea pig”) was long a marvel, at least

in respect to thickness, till Mr. Quaritch decided to far outrival it,

and make it appear slim by the side of his huge volumes. Henry Bohn was

a remarkable man, and the cultivator of many tastes. In later life he

neglected second-hand bookselling for publishing and the selling of

remainders. He has already been mentioned as one of the chief of those

who have supplied the public with sound cheap literature. Bohn was fond

of exhibiting his importance, and when at a book-sale he would,

catalogue in hand, inspect the lots far ahead, and occasionally look up

and arrest the course of the sale by inquiring of the auctioneer what

was the number of the lot then selling.

Mr. Quaritch has outdone all previous booksellers by the grandeur of his

catalogues. They have grown in size and importance, until the last

General Catalogue, in seven volumes and nine supplements, a large paper

copy of which is in the Reading-room of the British Museum, throws all

other catalogues into the shade. The volumes containing the various

classes into which the catalogue is divided each form a most valuable

bibliography and a grand record of the present prices of books.

This is not a history of booksellers, and therefore more need not be

said of them here than that a body of men to whom book collectors are

greatly indebted may well be proud of numbering in their ranks those

already named, as well as the Pickerings, the Lillys, the Boones, the

Ellises, and the Bains, upon whose exploits we have not space to

enlarge.

AUCTIONEERS

William Cooper, a bookseller in a good way of business at the sign of

the Pelican in Little Britain, was the first to introduce into England

the practice of selling books by auction, when in 1676 he sold Dr.

Seaman’s library, and for some years he was the chief auctioneer in

London. His first catalogue--the first sale catalogue in England--is

exhibited in the Kings’ Library at the British Museum.

In 1680 Edward Millington, a better known man and a bookseller of

standing, took to auctioneering, and he and Cooper together divided the

chief business in this department. Other booksellers, such as Moses

Pitt, Zachary Bourne, Nathaniel Ranew, Richard Chiswell, and John

Dunsmore, Robert Scott, &c., sold books by auction, and Oldys styles

Marmaduke Foster, who made the catalogue of Thomason’s Civil War Tracts

in twelve folio manuscript volumes, an auctioneer. It is, however, of

the two foremost men, Cooper and Millington, that we want to know more,

and fortunately a wit of Christ Church, Oxford, George Smalridge,

afterwards Dean of Christ Church and Bishop of Bristol, was struck by

the humours connected with the sale in 1686 of the stock of a bankrupt

Oxford bookseller--Richard Davis, the publisher of several of the Hon.

Robert Boyle’s works. Smalridge wrote a skit on the proceedings, under

the title of “Auctio Davisiana Oxonii habita per Gulielmum Cooper,

Edoar. Millingtonum, Bibliop. Lond. ... Londini: Prostant venales apud

Jacobum Tonson, 1689.” This was reprinted in _Musarum Anglicanarum

Analecta_, vol. i. 1691.[11]

The sale, according to Anthony à Wood, took place “in a large stone

fabric opposite St. Michael’s Church, in Oxon., near the north gate of

the city, called Bocardo” (a prison in the Middle Ages), and apparently

it attracted a great deal of attention on account of the novelty of the

mode of sale. Smalridge fastened on the salient points, and he has thus

given us information respecting the conduct of a sale in the seventeenth

century which we should not otherwise have possessed. The persons of the

little drama are six Christ Church men--Arthur Kaye, Walter Bacon, Ed.

Stradling, George Dixon, Christopher Codrington, and William

Woodward--and in the pride of their learning they make sad fun of the

pomposity and ignorance of the poor auctioneers. We must, however,

remember that this is a satire and a caricature. Cooper is described as

“a man of wonderful and notable gravity,” with a monstrous paunch; and

Millington as having a Stentor’s lungs and consummate impudence, a very

windbag, whose hollow bellows blow lies.

Woodward took the part of Cooper, and Codrington that of Millington, but

when these characters were first pressed upon them, the latter urged

that “if a book is bad, I cannot pile encomiums on it, and prefer

Wither to Virgil, or Merlin to the Sibyls.” We are told that bids of one

penny were taken, and that when the third blow of the hammer has been

struck the sale was irrevocable. The auctioneers seem to have offended

the ears of the Oxonians by saying “Nep?tis” and “Steph?ni.” At the end

of the day Woodward is made to say, “I have spoken, I the great Cooper,

whose house is in Little Britain.” Codrington recites a long

rhodomontade ending thus: “I check myself and put a curb on the runaway

muses. But this mallet, the badge of my profession, I affix as a

dedicatory offering to this post--To Oxford and the Arts Millington

consecrates these arms.” Dunton draws a favourable portrait of

Millington in his “Life and Errors.” He says he “commenced and continued

auctions upon the authority of Herodotus, who commends that way of sale

for the disposal of the most exquisite and finest beauties to their

_amorosos_; and further informs the world that the sum so raised was

laid out for the portions of those to whom nature had been less kind: so

that he’ll never be forgotten while his name is Ned, or he, a man of

remarkable elocution, wit, sense, and modesty--characters so eminently

his, that he would be known by them among a thousand. Millington (from

the time he sold Dr. Annesly’s library) expressed a particular

friendship to me. He was originally a bookseller, which he left off,

being better cut out for an auctioneer. He had a quick wit, and a

wonderful fluency of speech. There was usually as much comedy in his

‘once, twice, thrice,’ as can be met with in a modern play. ‘Where,’

said Millington, ‘is your generous flame for learning? Who but a sot or

a blockhead would have money in his pocket and starve his brains?’

Though I suppose he had but a round of jests, Dr. Cave once bidding too

leisurely for a book, says Millington, ‘Is this your “Primitive

Christianity?”’ alluding to a book the honest doctor had published under

that title. He died in Cambridge, and I hear they bestowed an elegy on

his memory, and design to raise a monument to his ashes.” Thomas Hearne

does not give him so good a character. He writes under date 13th

September 1723: “Though the late Mr. Millington of London, bookseller,

was certainly the best auctioneer in the world, being a man of great wit

and fluency of speech, and a thorough master of his trade; though, at

the same time, very impudent and saucy, yet he could not at the end of

the auction, be brought to give an account to the persons who employed

him, so that by that means, he allowed what he pleased and no more, and

kept a great number of books that were not sold to himself. Whence arose

that vast stock of books, though most of them but ordinary, that he had

when he dyed, and which, after his death, were sold by auction.”[12]

“An Elegy upon the Lamented Death of Mr. Edward Millington, the famous

Auctioneer,” alluded to by Dunton, is printed in the “Works of Mr.

Thomas Brown,” ed. 1744, iv. p. 320, but the Rev. C. H. Hartshorne

quotes it in his “Book Rarities of Cambridge,” 1829, p. 450, from

Bagford’s Collection, British Museum, Harleian MSS., No. 5947. It reads

as follows:--

“Mourn! mourn! you booksellers, for cruel death

Has robb’d the famous auctioneer of breath:

He’s gone,--he’s gone,--all the great loss deplore;

Great Millington--alas! he is no more:

No more will he now at your service stand

Behind the desk, with mallet in his hand:

No more the value of your books set forth,

And sell ’em by his art for twice the worth.

Methinks I see him still, with smiling look,

Amidst the crowd, and in his hand a book:

Then in a fine, facetious, pleasing way

The author’s genius and his wit display.

O all you scribbling tribe, come, mourn his death,

Whose wit hath given your dying fame new birth.

When your neglected works did mouldering lie

Upon the shelves, and none your books would buy,

How oft has he, with strainèd eloquence,

Affirm’d the leaves contained a world of sense,

When all’s insipid, dull impertinence?

‘Come, gentlemen,--come bid me what you please;

Upon my word it is a curious piece,

Done by a learned hand--and neatly bound:

One pound--once, twice, fifteen: who bids?--a crown!’

Then shakes his head, with an affected frown,

And says ‘For shame! consider, gentlemen,

The book is sold in shops for more than ten.

Good lack a day!--’tis strange!’ then strikes the blow,

And in a feignèd passion bids it go.

Then in his hand another piece he takes,

And in its praise a long harangue he makes;

And tells them that ’tis writ in lofty verse,

One that is out of print and very scarce:

Then with high language, and a stately look,

He sets a lofty price upon the book;

‘Five pound, four pound, three pound,’ he cries aloud,

And holds it up to expose it to the crowd,

With arm erect,--the bidders to provoke

To raise the price before the impending stroke;

This in the throng does emulation breed,

And makes ’em strive each other to outbid;

While he descants upon their learned heats,

And his facetious dialect repeats:

For none like him, for certain, knew so well

(By way of auction) any goods to sell.

’Tis endless to express the wayes he had

To sell their good, and to put off their bad.

But ah! in vain I strive his fame to spread;

The great, the wise, the knowing man is dead.

And you in painting skill’d, his loss bewail;

He’s dead!--that did expose your works to sale.

Can you forget how he for you did bawl,

‘Come, put it in?--a fine original,

Done by a curious hand:--What strokes are here,

Drawn to the life? How fine it does appear!

O lovely piece!--Ten pound,--five pound;--for shame,

You do not bid the value of the frame.’

How many pretty stories would he tell

To enhance the price, and make the picture sell!

But now he’s gone!--ah! the sad loss deplore;

Great Millington!--alas! he is no more.

And you, the Muses’ darlings, too, rehearse

Your sorrows for the loss of him in verse:

Mourn! mourn! together, for that tyrant death

Has robb’d the famous auctioneer of breath.”

THE EPITAPH.

Underneath this marble stone

Lies the famous Millington;

A man who through the world did steer

I’ th’ station of an auctioneer;

A man with wondrous sense and wisdom blest,

Whose qualities are not to be exprest.

We have given so much space to Millington, because it is interesting to

see how similar were the practices of auctioneers at the first

institution of the business to what they are at the present time, and

also because Millington seems to have been considered the most famous of

auctioneers, until James Christie arose to take his place as chief

representative of the profession. It may be added to his honour that he

was a friend of Milton, who lodged in his house.

Richard Chiswell (1639-1711) was more of a bookseller than an

auctioneer, but his name must be mentioned here. He was one of the four

who issued the fourth folio edition of Shakespeare’s Plays, and he was

the official publisher of the Votes of the House. Dunton describes him

as “the metropolitan bookseller of England, if not of all the world,”

and says that he never printed a bad book, or one on bad paper.

Jonathan Greenwood, bookseller and auctioneer, is described by Dunton

as a worthy but unfortunate man, “so that the chief thing he has left to

boast of is a virtuous wife and several small children.” He adds, “But

he still deserves the love and esteem of all good men, for the worst

that can be said of him is, ‘There goes a poor honest man,’ which is

much better than ‘There goes a rich knave.’”

How little is known of some of these early auctioneers may be seen from

the fact that John Bullord, who sold books at the end of the seventeenth

century, is said by the careful John Nichols to be a member of the

well-known bookselling family of Ballard. I cannot find any information

respecting Bullord, but it is very improbable that this name was merely

a misspelling of Ballard.

The name of Samuel Paterson (1728-1802) will always be held in honour

among English bibliographers, for he was one of the first to improve the

art of cataloguing, and he gained great fame from his labours in this

department. He had one great fault, however, for he was so insatiable a

reader, that when in cataloguing he came upon a book he had not seen

before, he must needs read the book then, and thus his work was much

delayed, and often his catalogues could not be obtained until a few

hours before the sale. He was the son of a woollen draper in St. Paul’s,

Covent Garden, but lost his father when he was only twelve years old;

his guardian neglected him, and having involved his property in his own

bankruptcy, sent him to France. Here he acquired a considerable

knowledge of French literature, which served him in good stead through

life. When little more than twenty years of age he opened a shop in the

Strand, opposite Durham Yard. This bookselling business was

unsuccessful, and he then commenced as a general auctioneer at Essex

House. It was during this period of his life that he saved the

collection of valuable manuscripts formerly belonging to Sir Julius

Cæsar from being sold as waste-paper to a cheesemonger. He classified

the MSS., and made an excellent catalogue of them, and when they came to

be sold by auction they realised £356. Although Paterson made an

excellent auctioneer, he was no more successful financially than in his

other ventures. He therefore accepted the post of librarian to the Earl

of Shelburne (afterwards first Marquis of Lansdowne); but after a few

years there was a quarrel, and he was obliged to return to the business

of cataloguing and selling of libraries.

The Rev. C. H. Hartshorne, in his “Book Rarities,” mentions a print by

Nicholls in the British Museum, called “The Complete Auctioneer,”

representing a man with spectacles on, standing at a table covered with

books, which are lettered at the tops. Underneath are these lines--

“Come, sirs, and view this famous Library;

’Tis pity learning should discouraged be:

Here’s bookes (that is, if they were but well sold)

I will maintain ’t are worth their weight in gold.

Then bid apace, and break me out of hand:

Ne’er cry you don’t the subject understand.

For this I’ll say--howe’er the case may hit,--

Whoever buys of me--I’ll teach ’em wit.”

Although the London booksellers went into the country to sell books,

there were some local auctioneers, as, for instance, Michael Johnson

(the father of Dr. Samuel Johnson), who kept a bookstall in Lichfield,

and attended the neighbouring towns on market days. Johnson’s address to

his customers is taken from “A Catalogue of Choice Books, ... to be sold

by auction, or he who bids most, at the Talbot, in Sidbury, Worcester,”

and is quoted from Clarke’s _Repertorium Bibliographicum_ (1819)--

“TO ALL GENTLEMEN, LADIES, AND OTHERS IN OR NEAR WORCESTER,--I have

had several auctions in your neighbourhood, as Gloucester,

Tewkesbury, Evesham, &c., with success, and am now to address myself

and try my fortune with you.--You must not wonder that I begin every

Day’s Sale with small and common books; the reason is a room is some

time a filling, and persons of address and business, seldom coming

first, they are entertainment till we are full; they are never the

last books of the best kind of that sort for ordinary families and

young persons, &c. But in the body of the Catalogue you will find

Law, Mathematicks, History: and for the learned in Divinity there

are Drs. Souter, Taylor, Tillotson, Beveridge, and Flavel, &c., the

best of that kind: and to please the Ladies I have added store of

fine pictures and paper hangings, and, by the way, I would desire

them to take notice that the pictures shall always be put up by the

noon of that day they are to be sold, that they may be view’d by day

light. I have no more but to wish you pleas’d and myself a good

sale, who am

Your Humble Servant,

M. JOHNSON.”

The sale took place in the evening, commencing at six o’clock and

continuing till all the lots were sold.

The existing firms of literary auctioneers, Sotheby, Wilkinson & Hodge;

Puttick & Simpson; Christie, Manson & Woods; and Hodgsons, are all of

considerable standing, but Sotheby’s is of the greatest antiquity.

Samuel Baker, the founder of the house, commenced business in 1744 with

sale of Dr. Thomas Pellet’s library (£859) in York Street, Covent

Garden. He continued sole member of the firm till 1774, when he entered

into partnership with George Leigh (who is styled by Beloe “the finical

bookseller”). Baker died in 1778, in his sixty-sixth year, when he left

his property to his nephew, John Sotheby, who in 1780 was in partnership

with Leigh. In 1800 the style was Leigh, Sotheby & Son, John Sotheby’s

son Samuel being taken into partnership. In 1803 the business was

removed from York Street to 145 Strand, opposite Catharine Street, and

in 1818 to the present house in Wellington Street. The third and last

Sotheby, Mr. Samuel Leigh Sotheby, became a partner in 1837, and in 1843

Mr. John Wilkinson entered the firm as a partner. The style was Sotheby

and Wilkinson till 1864, when Mr. Edward Grose Hodge became a partner,

and from that date the name of the firm has been Sotheby, Wilkinson, and

Hodge.

The firm of Puttick & Simpson dates back to the establishment of the

business by Mr. Stewart in 1794 at 191 Piccadilly. The business was

bought by Wheatley & Adlard on the retirement of Mr. Stewart. For a

short time it was carried on by Mr. Fletcher, who was succeeded in 1846

by Messrs. Puttick & Simpson. In 1858 the business was removed from

Piccadilly to 47 Leicester Square. Mr. Puttick died in 1873.

The firm of Christie’s was established soon after that of Sotheby’s, and

James Christie the elder’s (1730-1803) first sale was on the 5th

December 1766, at rooms in Pall Mall, formerly occupied by the print

warehouse of Richard Dalton. Christie afterwards removed next door to

Gainsborough, at Schomberg House, and died there, 8th November 1803. His

son, James Christie the younger (1773-1831), was born in Pall Mall, and

was educated at Eton. In 1824 he removed to the present premises in King

Street, formerly Wilson’s European Emporium. Mr. Christie died in King

Street, 2nd February 1831, aged fifty-eight. Mr. George Christie

succeeded his father. Mr. William Manson died in 1852, and was succeeded

by his brother, Mr. Edward Manson. In 1859 Mr. James Christie, the

great-grandson of the founder, and Mr. Thomas Woods, joined the firm.

FOOTNOTES:

[10] _Bibliomania_, Part V.

[11] An annotated translation of _Auctio Davisiana_ was published in

“Book-Lore,” vol. iii. p. 166; vol. iv. p. 1. The translator possesses a

copy formerly belonging to Bishop Wordsworth of Lincoln, in which is

written, in a contemporary hand, _ex dono Bibliopolæ Ric Davis_.

[12] _Reliquiæ Hearnianæ_, 1869, vol. ii. p. 172.

CHAPTER III

PRICES OF MANUSCRIPT BOOKS

In a treatise devoted to an inquiry concerning the varying prices of

books, it is necessary that at least one chapter should be devoted to

manuscripts. There is no field of investigation which offers a more

interesting subject for study, and few that are more difficult to

master. Manuscripts are really more attractive than printed books,

because they are so various, and have been produced over a much longer

period of the world’s history. It is therefore strange that so few

authors care to trouble themselves about them; that this is so may be

seen from the large number of readers at the British Museum who are

contented to quote over and over again from the much-used printed books,

and the comparatively few who cultivate the virgin soil of the

Manuscript Department, where there are endless stores of unused

materials.

Manuscripts are usually somewhat miscellaneous in character, for they

consist (1) of some of the finest examples of the pictorial art of many

ages; (2) of the originals of the great works of antiquity; (3) of a

large number of valuable works that have never been printed; (4) of

charters, documents, letters, memoranda, &c., which are of great value,

but which are not books, and therefore do not come within the scope of

our present inquiry. In respect to the prices of the manuscripts, it is

very difficult to say anything of much value, because (1) many of the

most important manuscripts have been transferred from library to library

in bulk, and it is comparatively seldom that they come up for public

sale; (2) the buyers of manuscripts are fewer than those of printed

books, and therefore it is more difficult to arrive at a real standard

price for books which are practically unique, as there is no wide public

opinion upon the subject. But for the present purpose, a still more

important reason why this vast subject cannot be dealt with in a

succinct manner is, that the materials for its history have not yet been

thoroughly investigated by experts. The relative prices at different

periods are hard to understand, even in England, where money has been

better regulated than in most countries; but when we have to deal with

foreign countries and foreign coins, we are necessarily at a loss how to

convert into their present value coins which may have been depreciated

at the time we are dealing with, and have certainly been still more

depreciated since: for instance, what idea is communicated to the mind

of the modern reader when he is told that “Borso d’Este paid forty

ducats for a _Josephus_ and a _Quintus Curtius_, while his large

two-volume Bible cost him 1375 sequins”?[13]

In dealing with manuscripts, it is most important to distinguish between

plain and illuminated manuscripts. The neglect of this caution has led

to an exaggerated idea of the cost of books before the invention of

printing. Instances have been given of purchases at sums equal to a

king’s ransom. Hence it is supposed that books were so dear that they

were quite out of the reach of any but the richest personages. But this

view is erroneous, for we know that by means of the slave labour at Rome

and the organised work in the monasteries, plainly written manuscripts

could be obtained at a reasonable price. We know now that transcripts of

MSS. can be had at a price which, if dear when compared with the price

of a newly-published printed book, is by no means extravagant. What

could be done at a centre of civilisation like Rome, where books were

produced in large numbers and at low prices on account of the

organisation of literary production, could be done at other places.

There is evidence that at London, and at those seats of learning, Oxford

and Cambridge, where caligraphy was a profession, books were not

difficult to obtain. Every church and chapel must have had

service-books. Probably during the Middle Ages, when travelling was

arduous and expensive, persons living in out-of-the-way places had to

pay special prices for their literary treasures.

The late Professor J. Henry Middleton referred to this matter of cost in

his valuable work on “Illuminated Manuscripts” (1892). After quoting

from Aulus Gellius, he wrote--

“But ordinary copies of newly-published works, even by popular

authors, appear to have been but little more expensive than books

of this class are at the present day. The publisher and bookseller

Tryphon could sell Martial’s first book of _Epigrams_ at a profit

for two denarii--barely two shillings in modern value (see Mart.

xiii. 3). It may seem strange that written manuscripts should not

have been much more costly than printed books, but when one

considers how they were produced, the reason is evident. Atticus,

the Sosii, and other chief publishers of Rome, owned a large number

of slaves, who were trained to be neat and rapid scribes. Fifty or a

hundred of these slaves could write from the dictation of one

reader, and thus a small edition of a new volume of Horace’s _Odes_

or Martial’s _Epigrams_ could be produced with great rapidity, and

at very small cost” (p. 19).

In the fifteenth century, even, illustrated Books of Hours were produced

in France, Flanders, and Holland at a cheap rate. Mr. Middleton wrote--

“Education had gradually been extended among various classes of

laymen, and by the middle of the fifteenth century it appears to

have been usual not only for all men above the rank of artizans to

be able to read, but even women of the wealthy bourgeois class could

make use of prayer-books. Hence arose a great demand for pictured

_Books of Hours_, which appear to have been produced in enormous

quantities by the trade scribes of towns, such as Bruges, Paris, and

many others. These common manuscript Hours are monotonous in form

and detail; they nearly always have the same set of miniatures,

which are coarse in detail and harsh in colour” (p. 141).

Mr. Middleton gives some further information respecting the cost of

production of certain service-books taken from some church records in

the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries--

“From these accounts (1379-1385) we learn that six manuscripts were

written, illuminated, and bound, one of them with gold or silver

clasps or bosses, at a total cost of £14, 9s. 3d., more than £150 in

modern value” (p. 222). “Three Processionals only cost £1, 17s. 4d.,

being on forty-six quaternions of cheap parchment made of sheepskin,

which cost only 2-1/2d. the quaternion” (p. 223).

There was thus great variety of cost in the production of the various

kinds of books, but when we consider the matter, we shall find it

impossible to do other than believe that a demand for service-books, the

price of which was not prohibitive, must have existed.

The Rev. T. Hartwell Horne gave in his “Introduction to Bibliography”

some instances of the prices of manuscripts in the Middle Ages, but as

some of these were evidently exceptional cases, although they have been

used by historians to draw conclusions which we must consider as

erroneous, they need not be repeated here.

Dr. S. R. Maitland in his admirable work on the “Dark Ages” comments

with much acuteness on some of these cases as quoted by Dr. Robertson,

and shows that the historian has drawn a general conclusion from special

instances, which in certain cases have not been correctly reported.

Maitland adds that some writer a few centuries hence might--

“Tell his gaping readers ... that in the year 1812 one of our

nobility gave £2260 and another £1060 for a single volume, and that

the next year a Johnson’s Dictionary was sold by public auction to a

plebeian purchaser for £200. A few such facts would quite set up

some future Robertson, whose readers would never dream that we

could get better reading, and plenty of it, much cheaper at that

very time. The simple fact is, that there has always been such a

thing as bibliomania since there have been books in the world, and

no member of the Roxburghe Club has yet equalled the Elector of

Bavaria, who gave a town for a single manuscript” (pp. 66-7).

Interesting particulars respecting the composition, binding, and

expenses of Petrarch’s library will be found in M. de Nolhac’s monograph

on the subject. Petrarch kept copyists in his house, whose shortcomings

occasioned him much vexation. He bequeathed his library to Venice, and

the Venetians are accused of having suffered it to be dispersed, but it

would seem that it never reached them.

We may judge from the immense number of manuscripts still existing, in

spite of the wholesale destruction that occurred at various times, how

large was the output in the Middle Ages. It is therefore preposterous to

suppose that when books were being produced in large numbers in hundreds

of monasteries in Europe they were only bought by kings or great nobles.

During the troubled times of the Barons’ Wars there must have been great

destruction of literary treasures, and at the Reformation, when whole

libraries were destroyed and made waste-paper of, the ignorant waste was

appalling. “The splendid and magnificent abbey of Malmesbury, which

possessed some of the finest manuscripts in the kingdom, was ransacked,

and its treasures either sold, or burnt to serve the commonest purposes

of life. An antiquary who travelled through that town many years after

the dissolution, relates that he saw broken windows patched up with

remnants of the most valuable MSS. on vellum, and that the bakers hadn’t

even then consumed the stores they had accumulated in heating their

ovens.”[14] That so much is left after the wholesale raid on the

monasteries is largely due to the sound antiquarian taste of John

Leland, to whom we of later ages are supremely indebted.

In all times of political convulsions the learning of the world stands a

bad chance of escaping great loss, and we are told that twenty-five

thousand manuscripts were burnt during the horrors of the French

Revolution.

Carelessness and the contempt felt for old books are still the great

destructive forces in the East, and the Hon. Robert Curzon, who

travelled in search of manuscripts, gives in his “Visits to the

Monasteries in the Levant” (1849) a lively account of the irreparable

losses that are constantly occurring. (See also Archdeacon Tattam’s and

M. Pacho’s narratives of their negotiations with the monks of the

Nitrian Desert for Syrian MSS., and the subsequent experiences of

Tischendorf and Mrs. Lewis.) One of the most recent literary events is

the recovery of a number of Jewish manuscripts from a _Genizah_ or

storehouse of old papers and parchments at Cairo, where they were

preserved indeed, but entirely neglected.

The late Mr. Thorold Rogers paid considerable attention to the prices of

books, and recorded many valuable facts respecting them in his

important work, “History of Agriculture and Prices in England.” After

commenting on some prices in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, he

adds, “such prices indicate that written literature was not wholly

inaccessible to the general public” (vol. i. p. 646).

The particulars of the cost of church books give perhaps the best idea

of prices, because these were needed by a large number of the

population. Some of them were of small price, while others of a more

elaborate character were of great price. In the year 1278 the bailiff of

Farley spent six shillings and eightpence for books for the church, and

in 1300 the monks of Ely paid six shillings for a _Decretal_, and two

shillings for _Speculum Gregorianum_. In 1329 the precentor received six

shillings and sevenpence, with an instruction to go to Balsham to

purchase books.[15] In 1344 a Bible cost three pounds, and in 1357 a

book was bought for Farley church for four shillings.

Mr. Blades printed in his Life of Caxton an inventory of the library of

Jean, Duc de Berri, at the château of Mohun sur Yevre, 1416. At the

death of the duke the library contained one hundred and sixty-two

volumes, valued at 14,909 livres.

In 1443 twenty-seven volumes were purchased by the authorities of King’s

Hall, Cambridge, from the executors of John Paston (who had been their

steward), at a cost of £8, 17s. 4d. In 1447 the same college bought a

Psalter for three shillings and eightpence, and a Donatus for one

shilling.

In 1449 twenty new Processionals cost All Souls College one hundred and

thirteen shillings and fourpence, and in 1453 a book of Wycliffe’s was

bought for seven shillings and sixpence, and one written against him for

three shillings and sixpence.[16] A manuscript of 157 leaves, containing

some of the works of St. Gregory, was bought in 1455 for £3, 6s. 8d.

In 1459 Fastolfe’s books were highly priced; thus a fair Mass book was

fixed at ten pounds, and a Holy Legend at the same sum, while two new

great Antiphons were together £13, 6s. 8d.

One of St. Augustine’s Epistles, containing 179 leaves, sold sometime

after 1468 for £1, 13s. 4d., and about the same time one of St.

Bernard’s Treatises, written on 211 leaves, was bought by Richard Hopton

from the executors of a former possessor for twenty shillings.

Perhaps a rather more accurate idea of the cost of manuscript books can

be obtained from a consideration of the cost of materials and the pay of

the scribes, and, fortunately, particulars have come down to us which

allow of a comparison of the various expenses.

A pocket lectionary was made in 1265 for the use of Eleanor de Montfort,

Countess of Leicester, and sister of Henry III. Twenty dozen of fine

vellum were purchased for the work at the price of ten shillings, and

the writing, which was executed at Oxford, cost fourteen shillings.

Richard du Marche, an illuminator, was paid forty shillings for

illuminating a Psalter and a pair of tablets for Queen Eleanor, consort

of Edward I.

In the same accounts of this queen an entry is made of £6, 13s. 4d. to

Adam the royal goldsmith for work done upon certain books.[17]

Professor Middleton printed in his “Illuminated Manuscripts” (pp.

220-23) extracts from the Manuscript Records of the Collegiate Church of

St. George at Windsor, from which it appears that John Prust (Canon of

Windsor from 1379 to 1385) was paid £14, 9s. 3d. for six manuscripts

written, illuminated, and bound, one of them with gold or silver clasps

or bosses. The six books were an _Evangeliarium_, a _Martyrologium_, an

_Antiphonale_, and three _Processionals_. The items of each are as

follows:--

_Evangeliarium._

£ _s._ _d._

19 quaternions (quires) of vellum at 8d. each 0 12 8

Black ink 0 1 2

Bottle to hold the ink 0 0 10

Vermilion 0 0 9

The scribe’s “commons” (food) for eighteen weeks 0 15 0

Payment to the scribe 0 13 4

Corrections and adding coloured initials 0 3 0

Illumination 0 3 4

Binding 0 3 4

Goldsmith’s work (on the binding) 1 0 0

---------------

£3 13 5

Two journeys to London and some smaller items made a total of

£3, 15s. 8d.

_Martyrologium._

£ _s._ _d._

7 quaternions of vellum at 8d. 0 4 8

Payment to the scribe 0 15 0

Illumination 0 5 10

Binding 0 2 2

Coloured initials 0 0 8

---------------

£1 8 4

_Antiphonale._

34 quaternions of larger and more expensive

sheets of vellum at 15d 2 2 6

Payments to the scribe 3 3 0

Adding to the musical notation 1 0 6

Coloured initials 0 1 0

Illumination 0 15 11

Binding 0 5 0

---------------

£7 7 11

(Twelve quires of vellum which were in stock were also used for this

_Antiphonale_.)

The three _Processionals_ only cost £1, 17s. 4d., being written on

forty-six quaternions of cheap parchment made of sheepskin, which cost

only 2-1/2d. the quaternion.

Mr. Falconer Madan tells us that “in 1453 John Reynbold agreed at Oxford

to write out the last three books of Duns Scotus’s _Commentary on the

Sentences of Peter Lombard_, in quarto, for 2s. 2d. each book,” and that

“a transcript in folio by this Reynbold of part of Duns Scotus on the

_Sentences_ is in both Merton and Balliol College Libraries at Oxford,

one dated 1451.”[18]

Sir John Fenn quotes in illustration of one of the _Paston Letters_ the

account of Thomas, a limner or illuminator of manuscripts residing at

Bury St. Edmunds, against Sir John Howard of Stoke by Neyland in Suffolk

(afterwards Duke of Norfolk), dated July 1467.

For viij hole vynets [miniatures],

prise the vynett, xijd viijs

Item, for xxj demi vynets,

prise the demi vynett, iiijd vijs

Item, for Psalmes lettres xv^c and di’,

the prise of C. iiijd vs ijd

Item, for p’ms letters lxiij^c,

prise of a C. jd. vs iijd

Item, for wrytynge of a quare and demi,

prise the quayr, xxd ijs vjd

Item, for wrytenge of a calendar xijd

Item, for iij quayres of velym,

prise the quayr, xxd vs

Item, for notynge of v quayres and ij leves,

prise of the quayr, viijd iijs vijd

Item, for capital drawynge iij^c and di’,

the prise iijd

Item, for floryshynge of capytallis, v^c vd

Item, for byndynge of the boke xijs

---------------

cs ijd[19]

This list of charges is of great interest and of much value in

illustrating the cost of illumination in the fifteenth century. The

price of the binding seems to be very considerable as compared with the

work of the illuminator, unless it included the cost of gold or other

expensive decoration. Mr. Middleton gives also particulars of the cost

of writing, illuminating, and binding a manuscript _Lectionary_,

1469-71, the total expense of which was £3, 4s. 1d. These are taken from

the Parish Accounts of the Church of St. Ewen, in Bristol--

1468-69.

Item, for j dossen and v quayers of vellom

to perform the legend

[_i.e._ to write the lectionary on] xs vjd

Item, for wrytyng of the same xxvs

Item, for ix skynnys and j quayer of velom

to the same legend vs vjd

Item, for wrytyng of the forseyd legend iiijs ijd

1470-71.

Item, for a red Skynne to kever the legent vd

Also for the binding and correcting vs

of the seid Boke

Also for the lumining of the seid legent xiijs vjd[20]

Among the _Paston Letters_ is a letter from William Ebesham to his

“moost worshupfull maister, Sir John Paston,” 1469 (?), asking for

payment for his labours in writing, the charge for which was a penny per

leaf for verse, and twopence a leaf for prose. Appended to this letter

is the following interesting account:--

Folowyng apperith, parcelly, dyvers and soondry maner of writynge,

which I, William Ebesham, have wreetyn for my gode and woorshupfull

maistir, Sir John Paston, and what money I have resceyvid and what

is unpaide.

First, I did write to his maistership

a little booke of Pheesyk, for which I had

paide by Sir Thomas Leevys in Westminster xxd

Item, I had for the wrytyng of half the Prevy

seale of Pampyng viijd

Item, for the wrytynge of the seid hole prevy

seale of Sir Thomas ijs

Item, I wrote viij of the Witnessis in

parchement, but aftir xiiijd a peece,

for which I was paide of Sir Thomas xs

Item, while my seide maister over the see

in Midsomertime. Calle sett me a warke

to wryte two tymes the prevy seale in papir,

and then after cleerely in parchement iiijs viijd

And also wrote the same tyme oon mo of

the largest witnessis, and other dyvers

and necessary wrytyngs, for which he

promisid me xs, whereof I had of Calle

but iiijs viijd. car. vs iiij vs iiijd

I resceyvid of Sir Thomas at Westminster

penultimo die Oct. anno viiij iijs iiijd

Item, I did write to quairs of papir of

witnessis, every quair conteyning

xiiij leves after ijd a leff iiijs viijd

Item, as to the Grete Booke--First, for

wrytyng of the Coronacion, and other

tretys of Knyghthode, in that quaire

which conteyneth a xiij levis and more

ijd a lef ijs ijd

Item, for the tretys of Werre in iiij books,

which conteyneth lx levis aftir ijd a

leaff xs

Item, for _Othea_ pistill, which conteyneth

xliij leves vijs iid

Item, for the Chalengs and the acts of

Armes which is xxviij^ti less iiijs viijd

Item, for _De Regimine Principum_, which

conteyneth xlv^ti leves, aftir a peny a

leef, which is right wele worth iijs ixd

Item, for Rubrissheyng of all the booke iijs iiijd[21]

The “Grete Booke,” described above, is now among the Lansdowne

Manuscripts (No. 285) in the British Museum, and is fully described in

the Catalogue of that Collection, 1812 (Part II., pp. 99-102).

In quoting the foregoing particulars of the early sale of MSS. and of

the cost of production, no attempt has been made to calculate the

present value of the amounts set down, because the data for such a

calculation are not available. It will, however, be well if the reader

remembers that the various amounts mentioned must have been equal at the

very least to ten times these sums in the present day. Professor

Middleton multiplies by ten, but when we find an expert scribe charging

one penny and twopence for one leaf, and the “commons” of another is set

down at tenpence per week, we may safely reckon the multiplier at

considerably more than ten in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries.

The scribes and illuminators already mentioned were the individual

workers, who were employed by corporations and men of wealth to produce

books for their libraries; but the wholesale producers of books, who

employed armies of scribes, must not be overlooked in this place.

Vespasiano di Bisticci of Florence (_b._ 1421) was the chief of these

booksellers, and he assisted to form the three most famous libraries in

Italy--the Laurentian in Florence, that of the Vatican, and the library

of Federigo, Duke of Urbino, which was afterwards bought by Pope

Alexander VII. and incorporated into the Vatican Library. Vespasiano was

an author as well as a bookseller, and has recorded some of his doings

in his _Vite degli Uomini Illustri_. He gives a detailed list of the

works he obtained for the Duke of Urbino, which comprised all the known

classics, the Fathers, books on astrology, science, medicine, art,

music, and all the Italian authors and poets. Vespasiano claimed that in

this magnificent library, which cost 30,000 ducats, every author was

found complete, and not a page of his writings was missing. Every book

was written on vellum, and there was not a single one of which he was

ashamed. Vespasiano was ever ready to form a library, as the following

anecdote will prove.

Niccolo Niccoli having spent a long life and all his patrimony in

collecting, left his books to Cosimo to found a public library. Cosimo

built the fine pillared hall in the Convent of San Marco, and then

proposed to form a worthy public library, of which the legacy of Niccoli

should be the nucleus. He sent for Vespasiano for his advice, who said,

“You could not _buy_ books enough.” “Then what would you do?” asked

Cosimo. “Have them written,” replied the bookseller. On which Cosimo

gave the commission, and Vespasiano set forty-five scribes and

illuminators to work, and furnished two hundred volumes in twenty-two

months. Cosimo was so pleased with the books, that he employed the

successful purveyor to supply the illuminated Psalters and Missals for

the Church of the new Convent of San Marco.[22] No wonder, perhaps, that

Vespasiano expresses his great dislike for the new-fangled art of

printing. Every century has its own social convulsion, and thinks it the

most important of all time. We talk of the revolutionary change made by

the introduction of machinery in the nineteenth century, but we seldom

realise how great a change in the occupations of the people took place

in the fifteenth century, at the period of the invention of printing.

Large numbers of men entirely dependent on their labours as scribes were

thrown out of work. Many of these men were members of influential

bodies, who were not inclined to sit down idly under their misfortunes,

so they petitioned against the use of printing; but fate was too

powerful for them, and their endeavours to boycott the printing-press

were not successful, even though Vespasiano di Bisticci said that Duke

Federigo would have been ashamed to have a printed book in his library.

John of Trittenheim, Abbot of Spanheim, who is known in literature as

Trithemius, said some hard things against printing in an essay, _De

Laude Scriptorum Manualium_, thus--

“A work written on parchment could be preserved for a thousand

years, while it is probable that no volume printed on paper will

last for more than two centuries. Many important works have not been

printed, and the copies required of these must be prepared by

scribes. The scribe who ceases to perform his work because of the

invention of printing can be no true lover of books, in that,

regarding only the present, he gives no due thought to the

intellectual cultivation of his successors. The printer has no care

for the beauty and the artistic form of books, while with the scribe

this is a labour of love.”

When, however, Trithemius found it necessary to exhort his own monks, he

was not able to speak very favourably of their love of books--

“There is, in my opinion, no manual labour more becoming a monk than

the writing of ecclesiastical books, and preparing what is needful

for others who write them, for this holy labour will generally admit

of being interrupted by prayer and of watching for the food of the

soul no less than of the body. Need, also, urges us to labour

diligently in writing books, if we desire to have at hand the means

of usefully employing ourselves in spiritual studies. For you see

that all the library of this monastery, which formerly was fine and

large, has been so dissipated, sold, and made away with by the

disorderly monks before us, that when I came I found but fourteen

volumes.”[23]

Others were wiser than to oppose the new art, and many scribes,

recognising the inevitable destruction of their trade, became printers.

Caxton’s master, Colard Mansion, was an extensive writer of manuscripts

before he took to the business of printing at Bruges. Much has been

written upon famous collections of manuscripts, and upon the individual

works which compose them, but it is not often that these come to public

auction, so that the particulars of prices are comparatively meagre. The

grand collections of the British Museum and the Bodleian[24] are

preserved in safety for the use of the learned, and we only know that

they are of the greatest value. What they would fetch if sold now can

only be guessed, and it would be merely frivolous to inquire. Three of

the grandest collections in the Museum--the old Royal Library, the

Cotton, which was only saved from slow destruction by the establishment

of the British Museum, to which it was transferred, and the Harley,

which the nation obtained for £10,000--must now be of untold value.

The purchase by the British Museum of the library of Dr. Charles Burney

greatly added to the completeness of the collections of Greek Classics.

Among the manuscripts is the wonderful Iliad of Homer on vellum,

formerly belonging to Mr. Towneley, which, although it cannot be dated

further back than the beginning of the fourteenth century, is supposed

to be of the earliest date of the MSS. of the Iliad known to scholars. A

committee appointed to consider the purchase of the library stated in

their report: “With respect to the value of the manuscripts, the Homer

is rated by the different witnesses at from £600 to £800, and one of

them supposed it might even reach so high a price as £1000;[25] the

Greek rhetoricians are estimated at from £340 to £500; the larger copy

of the Greek Gospels at £200; the geography of Ptolemy at £65; and the

copy of Plautus at £50. One witness estimates the whole of the ancient

manuscripts at upwards of £2500, and an eminent bookseller at £3000.”

“The books with manuscript notes, together with Dr. Burney’s _Variorum

Compilation_, including the _Fragmenta Scenica Græca_, are estimated by

one at £1000, and by another as high as £1340.” It must be remembered

that this was written in 1818, and these prices may be multiplied

considerably at the present day.

Even those large private collections which have been in the market of

late years have mostly been sold in bulk, so that little light has been

thrown upon the current value of fine manuscripts.

One of the best sources of information respecting present prices is to

be found in Mr. Quaritch’s admirable catalogues of his collections of

literary treasures.

When the treasures of Hamilton Palace were dispersed by public auction,

the priceless collection of manuscripts was sold by private contract to

the German Government. The amount paid has never been officially

announced, but it is believed to have reached the sum of £75,000. Some

of these manuscripts were not required at Berlin, and they were sold in

May 1889 by Messrs. Sotheby for £15,189.

The gem of the collection was the fifteenth-century manuscript of

Dante’s _Divina Commedia_, illustrated with upwards of eighty drawings,

attributed to Sandro Botticelli. Of it a writer in the _Times_ said,

“This priceless volume may, without exaggeration, be described as the

most valuable manuscript in existence, from its artistic interest, for

it stands alone as an example of a literary work of the first order

illustrated by an artist of the highest rank.”

It is impossible here even to register some of the many beautiful works

that made the manuscripts of the Duke of Hamilton so famous. Great

dissatisfaction was felt by the British public when it was found that

these treasures were to be transported to Berlin. Before the final

decision was made, Mr. Ruskin, in a “General statement explaining the

nature and purposes of St. George’s Guild,” wrote--

“I hear that the library of Hamilton Palace is to be sold some time

this spring. That library contains a collection of manuscripts which

the late Duke permitted me to examine at leisure, now some thirty

years ago. It contains many manuscripts for which I have no hope of

contending successfully, even if I wished to do so, against the

British Museum or the libraries of Paris and Vienna. But it contains

also a very large number of manuscripts, among which I could

assuredly choose some for which the partly exhausted general demand

might be not extravagantly outbid, and I think the English public

ought to have confidence enough in my knowledge of art and history

to trust me with a considerable sum for this purpose.”

Mr. Quaritch, who entered into Mr. Ruskin’s plans, circulated this

pamphlet, and asked for contributions to be sent to him, which he would

forward to Mr. Ruskin. Had the Government of this country been of the

same mind with Mr. Ruskin, these manuscripts would not have been lost to

the country.

The sale of the Hamilton manuscripts to a foreign Government naturally

caused those who were interested in these matters to feel great anxiety

lest the Earl of Ashburnham’s manuscripts, which it was known the owner

wished to sell, should also be sent abroad. This collection consisted of

upwards of three thousand manuscripts in about four thousand volumes,

and were made up of purchases from the Duke of Buckingham (Stowe) and M.

Libri; and of an Appendix consisting of separate manuscripts purchased

from time to time by the late Lord Ashburnham.

(1) The Stowe collection grew out of the library of MSS. formed by

Thomas Astle, the palæographer, and Keeper of the Records in the Tower.

Astle directed by his will that his collection should be offered to the

Marquis of Buckingham on certain specified terms, one of which was the

payment of the sum of £500. This amount was not of course any measure of

their value, and the bequest was made in gratitude to the Grenville

family for favours which Astle had received from them. A room was built

at Stowe by Mr. (afterwards Sir John) Soane to receive the collection,

in which were charters, registers, wardrobe accounts, inventories,

correspondence, and many items of the greatest historical value.

O’Conor’s Irish MSS. and the State Papers of Arthur Capel, Earl of

Essex, Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland in the reign of Charles II.,

afterwards found a home at Stowe. In April 1849 the Marquis of Chandos

wrote to Sir Robert Peel, stating that he had recently had offers from

private parties for the Stowe manuscripts, and offering them to the

British Museum. Sir Frederick Madden valued the collection at £8300, but

he was only authorised to treat with Lord Chandos for the Irish

manuscripts separately, and to seek for further information respecting

other portions of the collection. In the meantime, however, the whole

number were sold to Lord Ashburnham for £8000.

(2) Libri collection. In June 1846 the Trustees of the British Museum

applied for Treasury sanction to the expenditure of £9000 in the

purchase of the Libri manuscripts, but this was refused. In September

following renewed application was made for £6600 for the collection,

less the Napoleon papers valued at £1000. The Treasury allowed £6000

with commission to agents, but the negotiation failed, and Lord

Ashburnham obtained the MSS. for £8000.

(3) Barrois collection, chiefly consisting of French romances and poems,

was offered to the British Museum in 1848 for £6000. It was examined by

the Keeper of the Manuscripts, who recommended the purchase, but

apparently no application was made to the Treasury, and the collection

was soon afterwards sold to Lord Ashburnham for the same amount.

(4) Appendix of MSS. collected separately by Bertram, fourth Earl of

Ashburnham, among which were some splendid illuminated manuscripts.

With respect to some of these manuscripts a difficulty had arisen, owing

to M. Léopold Delisle’s claim that a large number of the manuscripts in

the Libri collection had been stolen from libraries in France by Libri

while holding the office of Inspector-General of Libraries. M. Delisle

also alleged that at least sixty of the Barrois manuscripts were stolen

from the Paris National Library. In November 1879 Lord Ashburnham

offered to treat for the sale of his library of printed books and

manuscripts with the Museum alone, or jointly with the French

Government, naming £160,000 as the price for the whole, and stated that

he had received an offer to that amount “from another quarter.” The

Trustees then asked whether Lord Ashburnham would treat for the

manuscripts alone, and his answer in January 1880 was that he had

ascertained that the offer he had received of £160,000 for the whole

library from a private individual was intended for private speculation,

and that the collection was worth a great deal more. This amount, which

comes to about £500 for each manuscript, seems to be very large, but

competent authorities have agreed to the valuation. At any rate, the

Treasury was not prepared to buy the whole at such a price, and the

Principal Librarian treated for the Stowe collection alone, the price of

which Lord Ashburnham fixed at £30000.[26] In the end these were

purchased for the nation.

For many years the late Sir Thomas Phillipps was an omnivorous collector

of manuscripts, and his collections were vast. They are gradually being

sold by auction. Several portions have passed under the hammer of

Messrs. Sotheby, and others are still to follow.

A very fine collection of illuminated manuscripts was gathered in a very

short period by William Morris. It is fortunate that a collection made

by one who knew so well what to buy is not to be dispersed or taken out

of the kingdom. As long as it remains intact it will be a worthy

monument of an enthusiastic lover of art who, while teaching the present

age, was not forgetful of the history of the earlier workers in the same

spirit.

We cannot register prices of such priceless manuscripts as the Gospels

of St. Cuthbert, for two centuries at Lindisfarne, and now among the

Cottonian MSS. in the British Museum, or the Book of Kells at Trinity

College, Dublin--both of the seventh century; but some few books of

great interest which have been sold by auction may be mentioned here.

The chief of these is the splendid manuscript of the Bible in the

British Museum, said to have been presented by Alcuin to Charlemagne.

The vicissitudes of this book are very remarkable. It was confiscated

during the French Revolution, and eventually came into the possession of

M. Speyr Passavant of Basle, who unavailingly offered it for a large sum

to the chief libraries of Europe. It was offered to the Trustees of the

British Museum, first for £12,000, then for £8000, and lastly for £6500.

The unfounded claims of the proprietor, who appears to have been very

much of a charlatan, appear to have damaged the repute of the MS., and

it remained on his hands. On 27th April 1836 the volume was put up to

auction at Evans’s rooms, and was described in six pages of a catalogue

in which it was the chief lot. It was catalogued as the Emperor

Charlemagne’s Bible--a manuscript on vellum by Alcuin, completed A.D.

800, presented to Charlemagne A.D. 801 at the ceremony of his

coronation, and mentioned in his will. The date is not undisputed, and

it is supposed by some to be of about forty years later. The statement

that this Bible is mentioned in the Emperor’s will is absolutely denied.

The price registered in Evans’s sale catalogue is £1500, and the

purchaser is given as Scordet, but the book was really bought in, and it

is said that few of the biddings for it were genuine. After this failure

fresh overtures were made to the British Museum, and in the end it was

bought for that library for £750, which must be considered a small

price for so splendid and interesting a book. There was some

correspondence on this Bible in the _Gentleman’s Magazine_, in which Sir

Frederick Madden took part. These letters are reprinted in Gomme’s

_Gentleman’s Magazine Library_ (“Literary Curiosities,” 1888, pp.

234-64). Another historical manuscript of particular beauty which has

been several times sold by auction, and now safely reposes at the

British Museum, is the famous so-called Bedford Missal (really Book of

Hours), written and illuminated for John, Duke of Bedford, Regent of

France under Henry VI., to whom he presented the book in the year 1430.

It passed into the hands of Henry II. of France, and long subsequently

into those of Lady Worsley (widow of Sir Robert Worsley), from whom it

was purchased by the Earl of Oxford, who bequeathed it to his daughter,

the Duchess of Portland. At the latter’s sale in 1786 it was bought by

James Edwards the bookseller for £213, 3s. At Edwards’s sale in 1815 it

was bought for £687, 15s. by the Marquis of Blandford, who afterwards

sold it to Mr. Broadley. At Broadley’s sale in 1833 Sir John Tobin

bought it for £1100. Sir John’s son sold it to the bookseller from whom

the British Museum purchased it in 1852.

Two instances of most interesting manuscripts sold at very inadequate

prices may here be recorded. One of the most distinguished among the

Ashburnham manuscripts was one known as the Albani Missal. It is a

manuscript of offices, and was executed apparently for Alemanno

Salviati, gonfalonier of Florence and brother-in-law of Lorenzo de’

Medici, and given by him to one of his relatives of the house of

Baroncelli. This beautiful volume contains five full-page miniatures,

each the work of a master. The first is by the hand of Amico Aspertini,

of Bologna, the pupil of Francia; the next is attributed to Lorenzo di

Credi; the third and fourth of high excellence, though unassigned; and

the fifth by Perugino, signed “Petrus Perusinus pinxit.” For this

artistic treasure Mr. James Dennistoun gave £20 in Rome in the year

1838. When he had purchased it he found that opposition to its leaving

Italy would be made on the part of the Roman authorities, so he had it

unbound and divided, and got it sent to England privately a few pages at

a time. He afterwards sold it to Lord Ashburnham for £700. These facts

were printed in the _Times_ in 1883 by a cousin of Mr. Dennistoun.

Mr. Madan gives in his “Books in Manuscript,” 1893, a very interesting

account of a bargain obtained by the Bodleian Library, which account is

here reproduced in a somewhat condensed form. “Six years ago [1887] a

little octavo volume, in worn brown binding, stood on the shelves of a

small parish library in Suffolk, but was turned out and offered at the

end of a sale at Sotheby’s, presumably as being unreadable to country

folk.” It was described in the catalogue as “Latin Gospels of the

Fourteenth Century, with English Illuminations.” For the sum of £6 it

passed into the Bodleian Library, and came to be catalogued as an

ordinary accession. It was noticed that the writing was of the eleventh

century, and that the illuminations were valuable specimens of old

English work of the same century, comprising figures of the four

evangelists, of the Byzantine type, which was common in the west of

Europe; the drapery, however, colouring, and accessories were purely

English. The book itself was seen to be not the complete Gospels, but

such portions as were used in the service of the Mass at different times

of the year. On a fly-leaf was found a Latin poem, describing how the

book had dropped in the water and was brought up by a soldier, who

plunged in after it. Surprise was expressed that the book was uninjured,

save a slight contraction of two of the leaves, and to this expression

was added, “May the king and pious queen be saved for ever, whose book

was but now saved from the waves!” Curiosity was felt as to the identity

of this king and queen, when the difficulty was solved by a reference to

Forbes-Leith’s “Life of St. Margaret of Scotland,” where this passage

occurs: “She had a book of the Gospels beautifully adorned with gold and

precious stones, and ornamented with the figures of the four evangelists

painted and gilt.... She had always felt a particular attachment for

this book, more so than for any of the others which she usually read.”

Then follows a story almost identical with the one given above, which

proves that the identical book is now preserved in the Bodleian Library.

It is not often that bargains such as these can be obtained, but in

spite of a great rise in price large numbers of manuscripts are still

purchaseable on reasonable terms. The late Mr. J. H. Middleton was

particularly urgent in pointing this out, and his words may

appropriately close this chapter--

“On the whole, a fine manuscript may be regarded as about the

cheapest work of art of bygone days that can now be purchased by an

appreciative collector. Many of the finest and most perfectly

preserved manuscripts which now come into the market are actually

sold for smaller sums than they would have cost when they were new,

in spite of the great additional value and interest which they have

gained from their antiquity and comparative rarity. For example, a

beautiful and perfectly preserved historical Anglo-Norman Vulgate of

the thirteenth century, with its full number of eighty-two pictured

initials, written on between six and seven hundred leaves of finest

uterine vellum, can now commonly be purchased for from £30 to £40.

This hardly represents the original value of the vellum on which the

manuscript is written.

“Manuscripts of a simpler character, however beautifully written, if

they are merely decorated with blue and red initials, commonly sell

for considerably less than the original cost of their vellum.

“A collector with some real knowledge and appreciation of what is

artistically fine can perhaps lay out his money to greater advantage

in the purchase of manuscripts than by buying works of art of any

other class, either mediæval or modern.”[27]

FOOTNOTES:

[13] Leader Scott’s “Renaissance of Art in Italy,” 1883, p. 193.

[14] “Letters from the Bodleian,” vol. i. p. 279 (note).

[15] Putnam’s “Books and their Makers,” 1897, vol. i. p. 159.

[16] Rogers’s “Agriculture and Prices,” vol. iv. pp. 509-604.

[17] “Manners and Household Expenses” (Roxburghe Club).

[18] “Books in Manuscript,” 1893, p. 43.

[19] _Paston Letters_, ed. Gairdner, 1874, vol. ii. p. 336.

[20] “Transactions of the Bristol and Gloucester Archæological Society,”

vol. xv., 1891, pp. 257 and 260, _quoted_ “Illuminated Manuscripts,” p.

223.

[21] _Paston Letters_, ed. Gairdner, 1874, vol. ii. pp. 334-35.

[22] Leader Scott’s “Renaissance of Art in Italy,” 1883, p. 194.

[23] Maitland’s “Dark Ages,” 1844, p. 272.

[24] Mr. Madan has given in Appendix A to his most useful and

interesting work on “Books in Manuscript,” 1893, a list of public

libraries which contain more than 4000 MSS. The largest collections are

as follows:--British Museum, 52,000, and 162,000 charters; Bodleian

Library, 31,000; Royal Library, Vienna, 20,000; Brussels, 30,000;

Bibliothèque Nationale, Paris, 80,000; Royal Library, Berlin, 16,000;

Munich, 26,000; the Vatican, Rome, 23,600; Biblioteca Nazionale,

Florence, 15,000; Biblioteca Nacional, Madrid, 25,000.

[25] Dr. Burney gave £620 for it at Towneley’s sale, 1815.

[26] These particulars are obtained from the official reports.

[27] J. H. Middleton, “Illuminated MSS.,” 1892, pp. 263-64.

CHAPTER IV

PUBLISHED PRICES

It was impossible for the scribe (however low his pay might be reduced)

to compete with the printing-press, and we have good authority for

saying that printed books could be obtained in the fifteenth century for

one-fifth of what would have been the cost of the same books in

manuscript. Mr. Putnam, in his interesting work on the history of

bookselling, quotes from Bishop John of Aleria, who, writing to Pope

Paul II. in 1467, said that it was possible to purchase in Rome for 20

gulden in gold works which a few years earlier would have cost not less

than 100 gulden. Other books selling for 4 gulden would previously have

cost 20. Mr. Putnam also quotes Madden, to the effect that in 1470 a

copy of the forty-eight line Bible, printed on parchment, could be

bought in Paris for 2000 francs, while the cost of the same text a few

years earlier in manuscript would have been 10,000 francs.

It is rather curious to find that the present custom of fixing a

published price is comparatively modern, and that the system for which

some of our present retail booksellers yearn--that is, of buying from

the publishers in bulk and retailing at their own price--was formerly

in common use. In the old catalogues of English books no prices are

affixed to the various entries, and the custom of printing the prices of

books was not general until the end of the seventeenth century. But

after all the booksellers’ latitude was not very great, for the law

stepped in to limit the price of books.

We might naturally have supposed that the invention of printing would

have made a complete break in the mode of selling books, but this was

not so. Continuity was preserved, and the company to which the London

trade belongs is not called after the printers, but after the older

order of stationers. In a “Note of the State of the Company of Printers,

Bookesellers, and Bookebynders comprehended under the name of

Stacioners,” dated 1582, we are told that “in the tyme of King Henry the

Eighte, there were but fewe Printers, and those of good credit and

competent wealth, at whiche tyme and before there was an other sort of

men that were writers, lymners of Bookes and diverse thinges for the

Church and other uses, called Stacioners, which have, and partly to this

daye do use to buy their bookes in grosse of the saide Printers, bynde

them up, and sell them in their shops, whereby they well mayntayned

their families.”[28]

It seems probable that the English booksellers before the introduction

of printing experienced little interference in their business from

foreign scribes, and therefore the bringing in of printed books from

abroad was distasteful to them. What they particularly objected to was

the importation of these books bound instead of in sheets.

By “an Act touching the Marchauntes of Italy” (1 Ric. III. cap. 9)

aliens were prohibited from importing certain goods into this country,

but this Act was not to “extend to Importers of Books, or to any writer,

limner, binder, or printer.”

In Henry VIII.’s reign this importation was found intolerable, and “an

Act for Printers and Binders of Bokes” was passed (25 Hen. VIII. cap.

15). It is stated in the preamble when the provision in the Act of

Richard III. was made there were few books and few printers in England,

but that at this time large numbers of printed books were brought into

the country--

Whereas, a great number of the King’s subjects within this realm

having “given themselves diligently to learn and exercise the said

craft of Printing, that at this day there be within this realm a

great number cunning and expert in the said science or craft of

printing, as able to exercise the said craft in all points as any

stranger, in any other realm or country, and furthermore where there

be a great number of the King’s subjects within this realm which

[live] by the craft and mystery of binding of books, ... well expert

in the same,” yet “all this notwithstanding, there are divers

persons that bring from [beyond] the sea great plenty of printed

books--not only in the Latin tongue, but also in our maternal

English tongue--some bound in boards, some in leather, and some in

parchment, and them sell by retail, whereby many of the King’s

subjects, being binders of books, and having none other faculty

wherewith to get their living, be destitute of work, and like to be

undone, except some reformation herein be had.”

Then follow some provisions respecting the sale of books at too high a

price--