Englishman has been so accustomed to seeing about him the finest things
of art and literature that in the course of years he becomes a trifle
bored. Perhaps we shall also, in the fullness of time, experience this,
but at present we are eager to fill the great libraries and edifices in
America with the rarest and most precious books. In the East, and in
the West as well, there are enormous library buildings of the finest
architectural types. Alas, they have not the books to fill them. The
Free Library of Philadelphia has spent nearly seven million dollars
on a superb edifice. It will be necessary to fill this building with
suitable volumes. The growth of American universities, unparalleled in
all time, calls for the apparatus of the student. They must have the
tools of their trade--books. It is no wonder that there are not enough
to go round. The demand is greater than the supply. Consequently prices
will go steadily upward, and it is well to secure them while we may.
[Illustration: PAGE OF THE ORIGINAL MANUSCRIPT OF WHITE’S “NATURAL
HISTORY OF SELBORNE”]
It seems a pity that some Americans give such enormous sums for
library buildings and spend literally nothing upon the volumes
themselves. Books, not edifices, make libraries. A friend of mine
only fifteen years ago spent four million dollars on a superb library
building; some are already complaining that it is no longer up-to-date!
Buildings pass; they soon become obsolete. Books alone are everlasting.
“Men may come and men may go, but books go on forever!” The late Mr.
Huntington used to say: “The ownership of a fine library is the surest
and swiftest way to immortality!”
I have to-day in my New York vault a collection of early English
manuscripts unequaled in any library on this side of the Atlantic.
It includes four manuscripts of Chaucer, two of Gower’s _Confessio
Amantis_, several of Lydgate’s _Fall of Princes_, and the famous
manuscript of Occleve’s _Poems_ with a contemporary portrait of
Chaucer. It will be impossible ever to secure another assemblage like
it, for it does not exist. They will be appreciated after the last
building has tottered on its foundation.
The past fifty years has produced in this country a group of book
collectors equal to any that has appeared in England or on the
Continent, men well in advance of their time, like the greatest book
lover of them all, Richard Heber. I always envied this bibliomaniac
his two possessions; as Sir Walter Scott so neatly puts it, “Heber the
magnificent, whose library and cellar are so superior to all others in
the world!” Would that Americans could be as successful gathering old
vintages as old books! In this, England has it all over us.
[Illustration: PAGE FROM A FOURTEENTH-CENTURY MANUSCRIPT OF THOMAS
OCCLEVE’S “POEMS,” SHOWING A PORTRAIT OF CHAUCER]
It is melancholy to record that in the last few months three of our
most distinguished collectors have passed away, each one of them
possessing in full measure the most extraordinary vision. I refer first
to Mr. Edward E. Ayer of Chicago, who was one of the pioneers in making
a serious collection of books relating to the American Indian, which he
presented, before his death, to the Newberry Library in Chicago. The
late Mr. William A. White of Brooklyn (of beloved memory) was among the
earliest of our collectors to gather the choice and alluring volumes of
the great Elizabethans. His judgment was excellent and he had a vivid
understanding of this golden period, equaled by few scholars. He did
not hesitate to lend his finest volumes to any student who showed an
intelligent interest in English literature.
I cannot speak at length of Mr. Henry E. Huntington. I feel his loss
too poignantly at the present time. He was, without doubt, the greatest
collector of books the world has ever known. Without possessing a
profound knowledge of literature or of history, his flair for fine
books was remarkable. His taste was sure, impeccable. The library at
San Gabriel, California, which houses his wonderful collections, will
be the Mecca of students for all time. No gift to a nation or to a
state can ever equal his. America does not appreciate it to-day, but,
as time spins its web, and the world becomes better acquainted with the
Huntington treasures, this fact will be adequately recognized.
I do not mean to imply that American collectors are forming great
libraries and art galleries solely for patriotic reasons, or for
the good of their generation. It is perhaps after all a secondary
consideration with them. Certainly it is not the first. Neither is
their motive the encouragement of scholarship or of the arts. It is
something more human. The bump of acquisitiveness is strongly developed
in our collectors, and perhaps I know this as well as anyone. They
like to exhibit their treasures as other mortals do, to show them
to their envious friends with a twinkle in their eyes and a certain
amount of deviltry. American amateurs, who have built railroads and
great suspension bridges, who have been financial giants and captains
of industry, must surely possess the red blood that made them thus. Of
course they like to flaunt a folio of Ben Jonson or a Keats’s _Poems_
(with a presentation inscription!) before the eyes of other collectors.
In these ecstatic moments they do not care a whit for the Nation or for
the people. But with the passing of years, with the gradual oozing of
the enthusiasm and candor of youth, they think of the ultimate disposal
of their books. It is then, and then only, that the people of America
come into their own.
[Illustration: HENRY E. HUNTINGTON]
It is a wonderful and magnificent thing that the gathering of books
in this country is in the hands of leaders of her industries, the
so-called business kings, and not in the hands of college professors
and great scholars. The latter, generally, in forming a collection make
a sad mess of it. The instinct of the collector, the _heluo librorum_
of Cicero, is entirely different from that of the scholar. They are
two distinct and separate faculties: the acquisition of knowledge
and the gathering of books. Men to be successful in either must have an
entirely different cosmos. Both are indispensable. It is paradoxical,
but true, that not a single great library in the world has been formed
by a great scholar.
Every year our collectors pitch their tents on the fair and hospitable
shores of Great Britain, where they exchange their useless gold for
ancient and modern English books. The pleasant bookshops all over
England, Ireland, and Scotland welcome the American visitors, who
take home with them such ingratiating little volumes as Herrick’s
_Hesperides_ and Lovelace’s _Lucasta_. The supply of such charming
volumes has become well-nigh exhausted. Nowhere can this migration
be more clearly seen than in the _Short-Title Catalogue of Books
Printed in England, Scotland, and Ireland, 1475-1640_ issued by The
Bibliographical Society. This monumental work has been compiled by A.
W. Pollard, G. R. Redgrave, and a host of the ablest English scholars.
A glance at its pages reveals the fact that there are many important
books of English dramatic poetry of which no copy now remains in
England. Take, for instance, the second edition of _Hamlet_, published
in London, in 1604. It is really the first edition containing the true
text, as the first, of 1603, was a pirated one, with inferior readings.
Twenty-five years ago three copies, all that exist, were in important
private libraries in England. To-day all three are in America--in the
Huntington Library, in the Elizabethan Club at Yale University, and in
the private collection of Mr. H. C. Folger of New York. The check-list
shows that of many of the most exquisite volumes of poetry and romance
not a single copy remains in the great country that saw its birth. On
the other hand, there are thousands of books remaining in the British
Museum, at the Universities and Colleges, at Lambeth, at Edinburgh,
in the Patent Office, at Peterborough, at Winchester, of which not a
single example exists in any library in the United States.
The situation, for England’s scholars, has certain compensations. The
books are really accessible in this country. Following the procedure
of the members of the old Roxburghe Club, beautiful reprints have been
made by American collectors of various great rarities and distributed
to the libraries of Great Britain. Heywood’s _King Edward the Fourth_,
1599, which exists in a single copy in the library of Mr. C. W. Clark,
has now been made in facsimile by the courtesy of the owner and issued
for the use of students. Wager’s unique Interlude, _Enough is as good
as a Feast_ (about 1565), has also been reprinted. It was in Lord
Mostyn’s library for many, many years, quite out of the reach of most
scholars. I trust no one will infer from this that the great English
collectors bury their things and are niggardly in offering their
books and manuscripts to the learned. On the contrary, the Duke of
Devonshire, Sir R. L. Harmsworth, and Mr. Thomas J. Wise have always
opened their doors to worthy scholars.
[Illustration: A CHAUCER MANUSCRIPT IN ORIGINAL BINDING]
It is a great mistake for England to think that America is willing
to pay mad prices for every English book. When bidding around the board
at Sotheby’s the trade have often smiled when they dropped a “hot
one” on me. I shall never forget when I bought a book for £640 in the
Britwell sale and someone kindly remarked, “Why, Richard Heber gave two
shillings for that very copy in 1826.” Needless to say it made not the
slightest difference to me what he paid for it, I only knew that I was
getting a great book and that no price was too high for it. Books of
intrinsic worth, that exist in one or two copies, cannot be measured
in terms of shillings and pence, or dollars and cents. Occasionally,
however, when bidding, for moral (or immoral!) effect, I have dropped
a common rarity on my competitors, and they have paid twice what I
thought the book was worth. And I might have been mistaken at that!
It’s all in the game. It is also a great mistake to think that when a
book is knocked down to an English bookseller it will remain within the
British Isles. There is nothing more fallacious than that. At least
fifty per cent of the purchases of British dealers eventually wend
their way to this country.
Once I had a serious qualm when relieving Great Britain of her
cherished belongings. That was when I purchased privately the Battle
Abbey Cartularies, the original documents of those valiant men who
came over with William the Conqueror. There were hundreds of deeds and
legal documents dating from the Battle of Hastings in 1066, bound in
ninety-nine volumes. They were the very foundation of English history.
It was with a feeling of genuine regret that I saw them leave England
forever. I hope in their home in the New World they will have the
tender attention and respect they received in their former abode in the
west of England.
[Illustration: LETTER SIGNED WITH INITIALS OF GEORGE (BEAU) BRUMMELL]
The muniment rooms in the great houses still retain valuable documents
of all kinds. A search through the many volumes and calendars of papers
issued by the English Historical Manuscripts Commission will reveal
the wealth of material still remaining in Great Britain. I remember
only last year looking with envious eyes upon the muniment chamber
of a noble family. There were ancient papers, rolls, parchments of
all kinds, bound volumes of letters, from floor to ceiling, some of
which had been in the same family for over eight hundred years. What
a treasure-trove for a student of the social and political history of
Great Britain! In looking quite casually over the lot I found a paper
bearing the signature of John Milton; another of Thomas Killigrew; a
whole stack of Samuel Pepys! My mouth began to water. I even thought if
I looked more thoroughly I might find one of William Shakespeare--who
knows? Professor Wallace found several in the Public Record Office in
London. The famous _impresa_ is in the Duke of Rutland’s collection
at Belvoir Castle. Why not find one hidden away among these old musty
records? It was, however, with a sense of relief that I heard the noble
owner say to me: “You cannot carry these off, Doctor Rosenbach. Thank
God, they are entailed, even my children’s children, if they fall on
evil days, will be unable to dispose of them.” Down in my inmost soul
I was delighted. Although I could never possess them, it warmed the
cockles of my heart to hear the words that blasted my hopes forever.
However, there are compensations. I was invited to visit the house any
time I came to England, and to examine at my leisure these entrancing
documents. My student days rushed back to me. How I should have been
rejoiced, in the old days, when I was making original investigations
into the beginnings of the English Drama under the guidance of my
beloved teacher, Dr. Felix E. Schelling, to study these papers, with
a chance of finding something that would add, if only a trifle, to our
knowledge of the subject. I felt a renegade. I had deserted the halls
of learning for the bookshop; I had given up my fellowship to enter a
business that would, perhaps, put money in my purse.
I did not, when at college, appreciate what a high adventure the
business was to prove, the excitement and anxiety of the chase, and
that I had a better chance, a far greater opportunity, to unearth
unpublished documents, and uncover original source-material, than ever
I could have as an instructor in English in some university. After
twenty-five years I am still of this opinion; although I sneakingly
hanker for the time when I can quietly return to my early love, and
carefully survey, without a thought of their commercial value, the many
interesting things that have fallen to my collector’s bag. Perhaps I
have been of some help to other students, who can investigate at their
leisure the great mass of material that I have been the instrument of
placing in their hands.
[Illustration: THE ENGLISH LIBRARY IN DR. ROSENBACH’S HOME]
The study of English letters in the universities of this country is
also responsible for the persistent demand for everything relating to
the language and literature of Great Britain. Theses on almost every
subject are being turned out regularly by candidates for the Ph.D.
degree. I would do almost anything rather than be compelled to read
most of them. I plead guilty, however, to having written one myself,
long before I dreamed of entering the more diverting sport of book
hunting. The quality of some of the work done by our scholars
is extremely high, almost astounding, like Dr. Hotson’s bombshell
describing accurately, for the first time, the death of Kit Marlowe.
All the professors in the colleges and all the students in the seminars
(how I hate this word!) are urging the university authorities to supply
them with books. And there is only one place to buy them--England.
It is no wonder, therefore, that we are probably getting ourselves
thoroughly disliked on the other side by carrying off, like so many
lusty buccaneers, the sacred treasuries of English thought. Admiral
Drake, the “dragon” of Lope de Vega, on his West Indian voyage looted
the pearls and emeralds of the New Empire, taking them back to England
to show to the Mighty Queen Elizabeth. _Our_ pirates are almost as
ambitious. We go after far more precious things, things that outwear
time and are not dependent on taste or fashion. The demand for
England’s books will not lessen; it will increase with every decade.
There are some English collectors, like Sir R. L. Harmsworth, who are
trying gallantly to stem the tide. Others are steeling themselves to
heroic efforts to check the onrush, but mere man cannot conquer an
economic situation of such dimensions. It will be impossible to check
the welling flood unless the Government comes to the rescue.
[Illustration: MANUSCRIPT OF ARNOLD BENNETT’S UNPUBLISHED PLAY]
As I have said before, the most sagacious among Englishmen do not
consider the matter a very serious one. They look with equanimity
upon the situation. They really admire the pluck and spirit of our
collectors, for the English are sportsmen of the first order.
Recently I was speaking to one of them about the Pierpont Morgan
Library. He said how marvelous it was that such a great collection
should be given to the public during the owner’s lifetime. He knew of
no gift to England of like magnitude. I reminded him of the splendid
Althorp collection of Lord Spencer, given in 1892 by Mrs. John Rylands
to Manchester, which equals anything in this country. We, however, have
just begun. New collectors and new libraries abound. New foundations,
with large sums for the purchase of books, are springing into being.
And yet some of the English (not the wisest) say that the United States
is a country where the dollars count most. A libel, of course. In fact,
some of our amateurs are almost prodigal, nay, quixotic in their use of
money. I know one who gave up a lucrative business in order to devote
himself to the purchase of old books. Bravo! Would that there were more
like him, not alone in this country, but in England as well.
Following the financial centre, the book mart has gradually shifted to
New York. In a few years it will be impossible to purchase the finest
English books in London. I have only recently sold to a well-known
English collector some volumes purchased at the Britwell sale, not
two years ago. I can foresee the day when Englishmen, with the taste
and ability to buy, will be browsing in shops in Philadelphia, in New
Orleans, in Minneapolis, in San Francisco, and taking their lucky finds
back with them to their old home.
IX
THE COLLECTOR’S BEST BET
“I don’t give a tinker’s dam about the money value!” We were working,
my uncle Moses and I, in his crowded bookshop on the second floor of
the ancient red brick building on Commerce Street in old Philadelphia.
Uncle Moses sat on top of a ladder before some shelves, arranging
his volumes, while I endeavored to find an important document in his
paper-stuffed desk. An old colored man, a messenger, had just staggered
up the stairs to deliver an enormous package. It proved to be, as
usual, a lot of crusty old books, and the last straw for me. I looked
despairingly at my uncle. Where were these to find room? Each corner
of the place, the chairs, tables, and his desk, was already filled;
and the shelves, of course, were laden. I sighed. Why was Uncle Moses
forever buying, buying, buying, and never--hardly ever--selling? And
what was all this newly arrived lot worth? It didn’t look like much
to me. It was then that he caught the trend of my thought and boomed
at me from the other end of the room. I was, you must remember, only
sixteen at the time, and had yet to learn that a little knowledge is a
dangerous thing.
Uncle Moses quickly came down from his ladder and gloated proudly over
the newly arrived pile of books. Then he fairly beamed as he turned
to me. “My boy,” he exclaimed, “‘Americana!’ That’s the stuff to
collect!” He picked up a volume, opened to the yellowed title page, and
read aloud: “Here is a _Discovery of the Barmudas, otherwise called the
Isle of Devils_. It is the work of Silvester Jourdain, 1610. Americana!
Even Shakespeare knew the fascination of it. It was this little book
which in part inspired him to write _The Tempest_!” He turned to light
his old meerschaum pipe, and as he did so, his battered, picturesque
top-hat, which had stood crowded between a row of books and the wall,
fell to the floor. I felt a savage glow of delight at this mishap.
But Uncle Moses ignored it. He was on a favorite subject, and he had
his most appreciative audience: me. Although I had not been born with
a caul over my face, he felt I had second sight--for books. And he
delighted to catch my imagination as a fair wind takes a sail, filling
it now this way, now that. It was something of a relaxation for him.
“Heaps of people,” he continued, “can’t seem to get it into their heads
that there is just as much drama in the history of our own country as
in any of the Old World empires. Hasn’t my friend Prescott made the
conquerors of Mexico and Peru live before our eyes? Talk about William
the Conqueror! What is the matter with Columbus, Cortés, and Pizarro?”
I was thrilled now--thrilled to the marrow when he talked like that.
And with gratification he watched me as I stood there transfixed.
“Think of the capture of the last Inca! Why, it is far more exciting
than the Battle of Agincourt. It outweighs even Shakespeare’s graphic
description in _King Henry V_.” He stopped for a moment, his
penetrating dark eyes sparkling with excitement. “But it is not only
the battles, the political intrigues,” he went on, “the early history
of our great industries is just as important. For instance, the old
forty-niners’ records of the first discovery of gold in California, the
beginning of the steel mills, the first railroad prospectuses, all this
country’s gigantic domestic activities! My boy, I envy you the years
ahead in which you will discover for yourself the color, the romance,
the mystery of your country’s history!”
[Illustration: TEA-SHIP BROADSIDE]
Monday Morning, December 27, 1773.
The Tea-Ship being arrived, every Inhabitant who wishes to preserve
the Liberty of America, is desired to meet at the STATE-HOUSE, This
Morning, precisely at TEN o’Clock, to advise what is best to be done
on this alarming Crisis.
Time has proved to me that my uncle prophesied well when he said that
Americana would have a unique and splendid place in the book world. And
although his prophecies were made many years ago, it is not too late
to-day to start collecting Americana. But, of course, to-morrow it may
be. They get scarcer every day; they will never be any cheaper; and of
one thing you may be sure: the value of Americana will increase with
the rising fortunes of America.
So many of the books and documents on which history is based have
been absorbed by public libraries and by historical societies that
the available source material itself has dwindled. In the old days,
when such friends of Moses Polock as James Lenox, Doctor Brinley, old
Menzies, John Carter Brown, Brayton Ives, Henry C. Murphy, James Carson
Brevoort, and countless others were enslaved by an inordinate passion
for books, they did not have to go far afield to find the things that
delighted their souls. The most precious relics were to be found
almost at their doorsteps. If they were in Philadelphia, it was to the
bookstalls along Second Street they went; in New York, to the drowsy
old shops of lower Broadway. In these and other places serious-minded
young collectors--can’t you see them in their stovepipe hats, their
high, tight collars, and enormous black satin cravats?--searched in
leisurely mood through the untouched treasure-hoards of Americana.
Indeed, those were the days when you could pick up Smith’s _History of
Virginia_ for fifty dollars almost as easily as you can secure to-day
the latest novel of a popular writer.
But, budding collectors, do not despair. Who knows but there are
nuggets hidden this very minute, at your hand? Hidden only because
you do not realize their potential value. Things which are considered
valueless to-day may soar high in favor in the near future. You know
that our grandfathers, not to mention their sisters and their cousins
and their aunts, could have bought the autograph letters of such
historical figures as Lincoln, Grant, Lee, and Jefferson Davis for a
few dollars during the years that immediately followed the Civil War.
And it was not until twenty years later that collectors began to gather
together everything they could find concerning Lincoln, for it was not
until then that he became a figure permanently great in the thoughts of
the people. His merest pen scratch took on a definite value, which has
increased steadily since then.
The World War has now been over for nearly nine years. Mementos of the
conflict which are to-day tolerated merely for their sentimental value
will be highly esteemed twenty years from now. They will be coveted
objects, not only in the eyes of the collector, but to the perhaps more
discerning ones of the historian as well.