fill a fairly long chapter. Among those who have lived here we may
mention Ephraim Chambers, whose 'Cyclopædia' is the parent of a numerous
offspring; John Newbery lived here for some time, and it was during his
tenancy that Goldsmith found a refuge here from his creditors, and wrote
'The Deserted Village' and 'The Vicar of Wakefield'; William Woodfall
had lodgings in this historic tower; and Washington Irving, early in the
present century, threw around it a halo of romance and interest which it
had not previously possessed.
[77:A] Hazlitt was a good deal of a book-borrower. In his 'Conversations
with Northcote' he speaks of having been obliged to pay five shillings
for the loan of 'Woodstock' at a regular bookseller's shop, as he could
not procure it at the circulating libraries.
[Illustration]
BOOK-AUCTIONS AND SALES.
I.
IT is perhaps to be regretted that the late Adam Smith did not make an
inquiry into the subject of Books and their Prices. The result, if not
as exhaustive as the 'Wealth of Nations,' would have been quite as
important a contribution to the science of social economy. In a general
way, books are subject, like other merchandise, to the laws of supply
and demand. But, as with other luxuries, the demand fluctuates according
to fashion rather than from any real, tangible want. The want, for
example, of the edition of Chaucer printed by Caxton, or of the
Boccaccio by Valdarfer, is an arbitrary rather than a literary one, for
the text of neither is without faults, or at all definitive. To take
quite another class of books as an illustration: the demand for first
editions of Dickens, Thackeray, Ruskin, and others, is perhaps greater
than the supply; but we do not read these first editions any more than
the Caxton Chaucer or the Valdarfer Boccaccio; we can get all the good
we want out of the fiftieth edition. We do not, however, feel called
upon to anticipate the labours and inquiries of the future Adam Smith;
it must suffice us to indicate some of the more interesting prices and
fashions in book-fancies which have prevailed during the last two
centuries or so in London.
The sale of books by auction dates, in this country at all events, from
the year 1676, when William Cooper, a bookseller of considerable
learning, who lived at the sign of the Pelican, in Little Britain,
introduced a custom which had for many years been practised on the
Continent. The full title of this interesting catalogue is in Latin--a
language long employed by subsequent book-auctioneers--and runs as
follows:
CATALOGUS | VARIORUM ET INSIGNIUM | LIBRORUM | INSTRUCTISSIMÆ
BIBLIOTHECA | CLARISSIMI DOCTISSIMIQ VIRI--LAZARI SEAMAN, S.
T. D. | QUORUM AUCTIO HABEBITUR LONDINI | IN ÆDIBUS DEFUNCTI
IN AREA ET VICULO | WARWICENSI. OCTOBRIS ULTIMO | CURA
GULIELMI COOPER BIBLIOPOLÆ | LONDINI.
{ GRUIS IN CÆMETARIO }
{ ED. BREWSTER } { PAULINO }
APUD { & } AD INSIGNE { PELICANI IN } 1676.
{ GUIL. COOPER. } { VICO VULGARITER }
{ DICTO }
{ LITTLE BRITAIN. }
As will be seen from the foregoing, Cooper had no regular auction-rooms,
for in this instance Dr. Seaman's books were sold at his own house in
Warwick Court. Mr. John Lawler, in _Booklore_, December, 1885, points
out an error first made by Gough (in the _Gentleman's Magazine_, and
extensively copied since), who states that the sale occurred at Cooper's
house in Warwick Lane. In his preface 'To the Reader,' Cooper makes an
interesting announcement, by way of apology. 'It hath not been,' he
says, 'usual here in England to make sale of books by way of Auction, or
who will give most for them; but it having been practised in other
Countreys to the advantage of Buyers and Sellers, it was therefore
conceived (for the encouragement of learning) to publish the sales of
these books in this manner of way; and it is hoped that this will not be
Unacceptable to Schollars; and therefore we thought it convenient to
give an advertisement concerning the manner of Proceeding therein.' The
second sale, comprising the library of Mr. Thomas Kidner, was held by
Cooper three months after, _i.e._, February 6, 1676-77. On February 18,
1677-78, the third sale by auction was held, and this, as Mr. Lawler has
pointed out, is the first 'hammer'[100:A] auction, and was held at a
coffee-house--'in vico vulgo dicto, Bread St. in Ædibus Ferdinandi
stable coffipolæ ad insigne capitis Turcæ,' the auctioneer in this case
being Zacharius Bourne, whilst the library was that of the Rev. W.
Greenhill, author of a 'Commentary on Ezekiel,' and Rector of Stepney,
Middlesex. The fourth sale was that of Dr. Thomas Manton's library, in
March, 1678. From 1676 to 1682, no less than thirty sales were held, and
these included, in addition to the four already mentioned, the libraries
of Brooke, Lord Warwick, Sir Kenelm Digby (see p. 120), Dr. S. Charnock,
Dr. Thomas Watson, John Dunton, the crack-brained bookseller, Dr.
Castell, the author of the 'Heptaglotton,' Dr. Thomas Gataker, and
others. The business of selling by auction was so successful that
several other auctioneers adopted it, including such well-known
booksellers as Richard Chiswell and Moses Pitt. At a very early period a
suspicion got about that the books were 'run up' by those who had a
special interest in them, and accordingly the vendors of Dr. Benjamin
Worsley's sale, in May, 1678, emphatically denied this imputation, which
they described as 'a groundless and malicious suggestion of some of our
own trade envious of our undertaking.' In addition to this statement,
they refused to accept any 'commissions' to buy at this sale.
[Illustration: _John Dunton, Book-auctioneer in 1698._]
The dispersal of books by auction developed in many ways. It soon
became, for example, one means of getting rid of the bookseller's heavy
stock, of effecting what is now termed a 'rig.' Its popularity was
extended to the provinces, for from 1684 and onwards Edward
Millington[101:A] visited the provinces, selecting fair times for
preference, taking with him large quantities of books, which he sold at
auction, and this doubtless was another method of distributing works
which were more or less still-born. John Dunton (who, the Pretender
said, was the first man he would hang when he became King) took a cargo
of books to Ireland in 1698, and most of these he sold by auction in
Dublin. This visit was not welcomed by the Irish booksellers, and one of
its numerous results was 'The Dublin Scuffle,' which is still worth
reading. Dunton's receipts amounted to £1,500. It was said that Dunton
had 'done more service to learning by his three auctions than any single
man that had come into Ireland for the previous three hundred years.'
[Illustration: _Samuel Baker, the Founder of Sotheby's._]
It may be pointed out that the early auction catalogues are of the
'thinnest' possible nature. The books were usually arranged according to
subjects, but each lot, irrespective of its importance, was confined to
a single line. The sales were at first usually held from eight o'clock
in the morning until twelve, and again from two o'clock till six, a
day's sale therefore occupying eight hours. Mr. Lawler calculates that
the average number of lots sold would be about sixty-six. The early hour
at which the sales began was soon dropped, and eventually the time of
starting became noon, and from that to one or even two o'clock. It is
quite certain that, up to ten shillings, penny and twopenny bids were
accepted. The sales were chiefly held at the more noteworthy
coffee-houses. Dr. King, in his translation (?) of Sorbière's 'Journey
to London,' 1698, says: 'I was at an auction of books at Tom's
Coffee-house, near Ludgate, where were about fifty people. Books were
sold with a great deal of trifling and delay, as with us, but very
cheap. Those excellent authors, Mounsieur Maimbourg, Mounsieur
Varillas, Monsieur le Grand, tho' they were all guilt on the back and
would have made a very considerable figure in a gentleman's study, yet,
after much tediousness, were sold for such trifling sums that I am
asham'd to name 'em.'
[Illustration: _Samuel Leigh Sotheby._]
[Illustration: _Mr. E. G. Hodge, of Sotheby's._]
It is curious to note the evolution of the book-auctioneer from the
bookseller. Besides the names already quoted, John Whiston, Thomas
Wilcox, Thomas and Edward Ballard, Sam Bathoe, Sam Paterson, Sam Baker,
and George Leigh, were all booksellers as well as book-auctioneers. Of
these the firm established by Samuel Baker in 1744 continues to flourish
in Sotheby, Wilkinson and Hodge. The earlier auctioneers with whom books
were a special feature, but who did not sell books except under the
hammer, include Cock (under the Great Piazza, Covent Garden), Langford
(who succeeded to Cock's business), Gerard, James Christie, Greenwood,
Compton, and Ansell.
[Illustration: _A Field-day at Sotheby's._
(Reduced, by kind permission, from a full-page engraving in the
_Graphic_.)]
[Illustration: _Key to the Characters in the 'Field-day at Sotheby's.'_
1. Mr. G. S. Snowden
2. Mr. E. Daniell
3. Mr. Railton
4. Mr. J. Rimell
5. Mr. E. G. Hodge
6. Mr. J. Toovey
7. Mr. B. Quaritch
8. Mr. G. J. Ellis
9. Mr. J. Roche
10. Mr. Reeves
11. Lord Brabourne
12. Mr. W. Ward
13. Mr. Leighton
14. Mr. E. W. Stibbs
15. Mr. H. Sotheran
16. Mr. Westell
17. Mr. Walford
18. Henry
19. Mr. Dobell
20. Mr. Robson
21. Mr. Dykes Campbell
22. Palmer's boy
23. Dr. Neligan
24. Mr. C. Hindley
25. Earl of Warwick
26. Mr. Molini
27. Mr. H. Stevens
28. Mr. F. Locker-Lampson
29. Mr. E. Walford]
The firm of Sotheby, Wilkinson and Hodge is, by nearly half a century,
the _doyen_ of London auctioneers. One hundred and fifty years is a long
life for one firm, but Sotheby's can claim an unbroken record of that
length of time. The founder of the house was Samuel Baker, who started
as a bookseller and book-auctioneer in York Street, Covent Garden, in
1744. At the latter part of his career, Baker, who retired in 1777 and
died in the following year, took into partnership George Leigh, and, at
a later date, his nephew, John Sotheby, whose son Samuel also joined the
firm. Writing in 1812, Richard Gough observes in reference to Leigh:
'This genuine disciple of the _elder Sam_ [Baker] is still at the head
of his profession, assisted by a _younger Sam_ [Sotheby]; and of the
Auctioneers of Books may not improperly be styled _facile princeps_. His
pleasant disposition, his skill, and his integrity are as well known as
his famous _snuff-box_, described by Mr. Dibdin as having a not less
imposing air than the remarkable periwig of Sir Fopling of old, which,
according to the piquant note of Dr. Warburton, usually made its
entrance upon the stage in a sedan chair, brought in by two chairmen,
with infinite satisfaction to the audience. When a high price book is
balancing between £15 and £20, it is a fearful sign of its reaching an
additional sum if Mr. Leigh should lay down his hammer and delve into
this said crumple-horn-shaped snuff-box.' The style of the firm was for
many years Leigh, Sotheby and Son. In 1803-4 a removal to 145, Strand,
opposite Catherine Street, was made. John Sotheby died in 1807, and the
name of Leigh disappeared from the catalogues in 1816. Samuel Sotheby
removed to the present premises, No. 3 (now 13), Wellington Street,
Strand, in 1818, not more than a few yards from either of the two former
localities. The last of the race, Samuel Leigh Sotheby, joined his
father in partnership in 1830, and is well and widely known as a
scholar and author of considerable note. In 1843 John Wilkinson became a
partner, and S. L. Sotheby died in 1861. The next alteration in the
style of the firm was effected in 1864, when the present head and sole
member, Mr. Edward Grose Hodge, was admitted into partnership. The first
sale was the collection of books belonging to Thomas Pellet, M.D.
Curiously enough, Baker's name does not occur anywhere in connection
with this sale on the catalogue thereof. The auction took place in the
Great Room over Exeter 'Change, and lasted fifteen days, or rather
nights, for the sale began at five o'clock in the evening on Monday,
January 7, 1744. The octavos, quartos, and folios, of which a selection
appeared in each evening's sale, were numbered separately, a process
which must have been very confusing, and one which was soon dropped. The
first day's sale of 123 lots realized £47 7s. 1d., whilst the fifteen
nights produced a total of £859 11s. 1d. One of the highest prices was
paid for Mrs. Blackwell's 'Herbal,' 1740, 'finely coloured and best
paper, in blue Turkey,' £14. The catalogue of this sale contained the
interesting announcement: 'That the publick may be assured this is the
genuine collection of Dr. Pellet, without addition or diminution, the
original catalogue may be seen by any gentleman at the place of sale.'
In 1754-55 Dr. Mead's books occupied fifty days, and produced £5,518
10s. 11d.; and in 1756 forty days devoted to the library of Martin
Folkes yielded no more than £3,091 odd. In February, 1755, Baker sold
Fielding's library of 653 lots (£364 7s. 1d.). Gradually more important
properties came to hand--the effects of Samuel Tyssen, 1802,
thirty-eight days, £9,102 16s. 7d.; Prince Talleyrand (_Bibliotheca
Splendidissima_), 1816, eighteen days, only £8,399; James Bindley, 1819,
twenty-eight days, £7,692 6s. 6d.; the Dimsdales, 1824, seventeen days,
£7,802 19s. Of course, very interesting days have been experienced where
the financial result was not very striking, as when, in 1799, the firm
disposed of the library of the Right Hon. Joseph Addison, 'Author and
Secretary of State,' for £533 4s. 4d.; and in 1833 of that of 'the
Emperor Napoleon Buonaparte' (_sic_), removed from St. Helena, for £450
9s. (his tortoiseshell walking-stick bringing £38 17s.); and, once more,
when the drawings of T. Rowlandson, the caricaturist, were sold in 1818
for £700. The libraries of the Marquis of Lansdowne, 1806; the Duke of
Queensberry, 1805; Marquis of Townsend, 1812; Count McCarthy, 1789;
H.R.H. the Duke of York, 1827; James Boswell, 1825; G. B. Inglis, 1826;
Edmond Malone, 1818; Joseph Ritson, 1803; John Wilkes, 1802; and a large
number of others, came under the hammer at Sotheby's from 1744 to 1828.
But the portions--the first, second, third, ninth, and tenth--of the
stupendous Heber Library, dispersed here in 1834, owing to the
prevailing depression, and what Dibdin called the _bibliophobia_, nearly
ruined the auctioneers. They rallied from the blow, however, and have
never suffered any relapse to bad times, whatever account they may be
pleased to give of the very piping ones which they have known pretty
well ever since 1845, when Mr. Benjamin Heywood Bright's important
library was entrusted to their care. The secret of this steady and
sustained progress is to be found in the general confidence secured by
strict commercial integrity. The house receives business, but never
solicits it. During the last half century nearly every important library
has been sold at Sotheby's, including the Hamilton Palace and Beckford,
the Thorold, the Osterley Park, the Seillière, and the Crawford
libraries.
[Illustration: _R. H. Evans, Book-auctioneer, 1812._]
But from 1812 to 1845 the most important libraries were almost
invariably sold by R. H. Evans, who began with the famous Roxburghe
Collection--this sale, it may be mentioned, was held at the Duke's
house, now occupied by the Windham Club, 13, St. James's Square--in
1812, and finished with the sixth part of the library of the Duke of
Sussex in 1845. We can only refer to a few of the more important of
Evans's sales, in addition to the two foregoing: In 1813 he sold the
fine collection of early-printed books collected by Stanesby Alchorne,
Master of the Mint, Earl Spencer having previously bought Alchorne's
Caxtons; in 1815 the Duke of Grafton's library; in 1818-19 two parts of
James Bindley's collection; in 1819-20 the White Knights Library of the
Marquis of Blandford; in 1832-33 John Broadley's collection of books,
which included the celebrated 'Bedford Missal,' bought by Sir John Tobin
for £1,100, and now in the British Museum; in 1833 Edmund Burke's books;
Lord Byron's in 1827; T. F. Dibdin's, 1817; the Earl of Guilford's, in
three parts, 1830-35; the fourth, sixth, seventh, eighth, and eleventh
parts of the Heber Collection, 1834-36; the books of Thomas Hill ('Paul
Pry'), 1841; Daniel and Samuel Lysons, 1820, 1828, 1834; G. and W.
Nicol, booksellers, 1825; Colonel Stanley, 1813; Sir M. M. Sykes, three
parts, 1824; and J. Towneley, 1814-45, 1828. A complete list of Evans's
sales is contributed by Mr. Norgate to _The Library_, iii. 324-330. Of
the auctioneer himself a few details will not be out of place. Robert
Harding Evans was the son of Thomas Evans, a bookseller of the Strand,
and served his apprenticeship with Tom Payne at the News Gate. Leaving
here, he succeeded to the business of James Edwards, Pall Mall, and was
induced by George Nicol to undertake the sale by auction of the Duke of
Roxburghe's library. The experiment was such a success that he became
almost exclusively known as an auctioneer, and his business as a
bookseller speedily declined. He was an admirable auctioneer, having an
excellent memory and a vast fund of information; but he neglected the
most important of all matters in commercial life, his ledgers. He had to
give up selling books by auction, but restarted as a bookseller in Bond
Street, with his two sons as partners; but his day was over, and here
failure again followed him. He died in Edwards Street, Hampstead Road,
April 25, 1857, aged eighty.
A few other firms of book-auctioneers, although, with one exception,
they have ceased to exist, call for mention. Sam Paterson, than whom no
more popular an auctioneer ever wielded a hammer, was, as we have
already seen, first a bookseller. Sam--we employ the little familiarity
by which he was universally known--was born in 1728 in the parish of St.
Paul, Covent Garden, and lived on till 1802, his death being the result
of an accident. He was not only a bookseller, but an author and a
traveller, and it was during a tour in Holland and Flanders that he
brought home a large collection of books, which he sold at auction. In
1757, Sam prevented the valuable collection of MSS. once belonging to
Sir Julius Cæsar from being destroyed; they had actually been sold to a
cheesemonger as waste-paper for £10. He rescued the whole collection,
and drew up a masterly catalogue of it, and when sold by auction the
result was £356. For some years he was librarian to the Earl of
Shelburne, afterwards first Marquis of Lansdowne. Sam's great talents at
'cataloguizing' were unrivalled: he compiled those of James West, P.R.S.
(whose library he sold at Langford's), 1773, the sale lasting
twenty-four days, and including a fine series of books printed by
Caxton, Wynkyn de Worde, and on Old English literature and history,
voyages and travels (see p. 179); the Rev. Thomas Crofts, forty-three
days, in 1783; Topham Beauclerk, April 8, 1781, and following forty-nine
days (the collection was dispersed by Sam himself 'opposite Beaufort
Buildings, Strand'); of the Fagel Collection, now in Trinity College,
Dublin, 1802, and others. Nichols states that the catalogues of the
libraries of Maffei Pinelli, sold in London in fifty-four days, 1789-90;
of Samuel Tyssen, 1801, thirteen days; and of John Strange, fifty-six
days, 1801, were compiled by the versatile Sam. The Pinelli catalogue
most certainly was not his work, for although he commenced it, he threw
it up at a very early stage. The Tyssen and Strange libraries were sold
at Sotheby's, for whom Sam 'catalogued' for some time. The book-hunter
in London will occasionally meet with a copy of the 'Bibliotheca
Universalis Selecta' on the stalls for a few pence, and he is strongly
recommended to buy this very admirable volume. It is a model catalogue
in its way; the contents of this sale (which took place at Sam's Great
Room in King Street, Covent Garden, on Monday, May 8, 1786, and the
thirty-five following days) are carefully classified, whilst the index
extends to nearly seventy pages. The volume is well interspersed with
Sam's annotations, and the published price of it is 5s. 6d. The second
condition of sale is extremely interesting; it says, 'No bidder shall
advance less than THREEPENCE under ten shillings; above ten shillings,
SIXPENCE; above one pound, ONE SHILLING.'
The chief rival of Leigh and Paterson was Thomas King, who from 1780 to
1796 had a shop in Lower Moorfields, but who towards the end of 1796
moved to King Street, Covent Garden, and set up as an auctioneer. At
first it was King and Son, but the son, early in the present century,
started for himself in Tavistock Street, when the elder King's
son-in-law, Lochée, became a partner. The firm existed into the second
decade of the present century, and sold many important libraries,
notably Isaac Reed's, in 1807, which lasted thirty-nine days, and
included a very extraordinary collection of works relating to the
English drama and poetry; Dr. Richard Farmer's, in 1798, lasting
thirty-six days; John Maddison's, of the Foreign Department in the Post
Office, 1802, twenty-two days; George Steevens's, May 13, 1800, eleven
days; and John Horne Tooke's, May 26, 1813, four days. It is scarcely
necessary to point out that either of the foregoing remarkable libraries
would give 'tone' to the annals of any book-auction house. The
collection of the Rev. John Brand (see p. 179), of the Society of
Antiquaries, was sold by Stewart, the founder of Puttick's, of
Piccadilly, in 1807-8, when 4,064 lots realized a total of £6,151 15s.;
he also sold the libraries of Lord Thurlow, of W. Bryant, etc. Other
auctioneers who occasionally sold books during the earlier part of the
present century were Jeffrey, of Pall Mall, who in 1810 sold Dr.
Benjamin Heath's library in thirty-two days, the 4,786 lots realizing
£8,899; Cochrane, of Catherine Street, who in 1816 (twelve days)
dispersed an exceedingly interesting library originally formed between
1610 and 1650 by Sir Robert Gordon, of Gordonstoun, one of the Gentlemen
of the Bedchamber of James I. and Charles I.; Compton, of Conduit
Street, who in 1783-84 (fifteen days) sold Joseph Gulston's library;
Robins, of Warwick Street; and T. and J. Egerton, of Scotland Yard.
[Illustration: _John Walker, Book-auctioneer, 1776._]
Mention may be here made of one who for many years occupied an important
position in the fraternity. John Walker, brother-in-law of the elder
George Robinson, was the book-auctioneer to the trade, and frequently
knocked down from £10,000 to £40,000 worth of books in the course of an
afternoon. In 1776 Walker was in partnership with J. Fielding, and in
early life combined with the book-trade the office of one of the
coal-meters of the City of London. He resigned the hammer to William
Hone about 1812, and died at Camberwell in February, 1817. A sketch of
his life and a portrait of him appear in the fifth volume of the
_Wonderful Magazine_.
[Illustration: _Staircase at Puttick and Simpson's._]