[Footnote 5: The Cottonian collection is the richest English historic
library we possess, and is now located in the British Museum, having
been purchased for the use of the nation by Parliament in 1707, at a
cost of 4500_l._ The collection of Sir Hans Sloane was added thereto in
1753, for the sum of 20,000_l._ Dr. Birch and Mr. Cracherode bequeathed
their most valuable collections to the British Museum. Mr. Douce is the
only collector in the list above who bequeathed his curious gatherings
elsewhere. He was an officer of the Museum for many years, but preferred
to leave his treasures to the Bodleian Library, where they are preserved
intact, according to his earnest wish, a wish he feared might not be
gratified in the national building. It is to this scholar and friend,
the author of these volumes has dedicated them, as a lasting memorial of
an esteem which endured during the life of each.]
[Footnote 6: By Mr. Inglis, in 1832. This famous bishop is said to have
possessed more books than all the others in England put together. Like
Magliabechi, he lived among them, and those who visited him had to
dispense with ceremony and step over the volumes that always strewed his
floor.]
[Footnote 7: The earliest decorated books were the Consular Diptycha,
ivory bookcovers richly sculptured in relief, and destined to contain
upon their tablets the Fasti Consulares, the list ending with the name
of the new consul, whose property they happened to be. Such as have
descended to our own times appear to be works of the lower empire. They
were generally decorated with full length figures of the consul and
attendants, superintending the sports of the circus, or conjoined with
portraits of the reigning prince and emblematic figures. The Greek
Church adopted the style for the covers of the sacred volume, and
ancient clerical libraries formerly possessed many such specimens of
early bookbinding; the covers being richly sculptured in ivory, with
bas-reliefs designed from Scripture history. Such ivories were sometimes
placed in the centre of the covers, and framed in an ornamental
metal-work studded with precious stones and engraved cameos. The
barbaric magnificence of these volumes has never been surpassed; the era
of Charlemagne was the culmination of their glory. One such volume,
presented by that sovereign to the Cathedral at Treves, is enriched with
Roman ivories and decorative gems. The value of manuscripts in the
middle ages, suggested costly bindings for books that consumed the
labour of lives to copy, and decorate with ornamental letters, or
illustrative paintings. In the fifteenth century covers of leather
embossed with storied ornament were in use; ladies also frequently
employed their needles to construct, with threads of gold and silver, on
grounds of coloured silk, the cover of a favourite volume. In the
British Museum one is preserved of a later date--the work of our Queen
Elizabeth. In the sixteenth century small ornaments, capable of being
conjoined into a variety of elaborate patterns, were first used for
stamping the covers with gilding; the leather was stained of various
tints, and a beauty imparted to volumes which has not been surpassed by
the most skilful modern workmen.]
[Footnote 8: The Fuggers were a rich family of merchants, residing at
Augsburg, carrying on trade with both the Indies, and from thence over
Europe. They were ennobled by the Emperor Maximilian I. Their wealth
often maintained the armies of Charles V.; and when Anthony Fugger
received that sovereign at his house at Augsburg he is said, as a part
of the entertainment, to have consumed in a fire of fragrant woods the
bond of the emperor who condescended to become his guest.]
[Footnote 9: A living poet thus enthusiastically describes the charms of
a student's life among his books--"he has his Rome, his Florence, his
whole glowing Italy, within the four walls of his library. He has in his
books the ruins of an antique world, and the glories of a modern
one."--Longfellow's _Hyperion_.]