Non illa colo calathisve Minervae
Foemineas assueta manus.--VIRG.
Some months ago, my friend Sir Roger, being in the country, enclosed a
letter to me, directed to a certain lady whom I shall here call by the
name of Leonora, and as it contained matters of consequence, desired me
to deliver it to her with my own hand. Accordingly I waited upon her
ladyship pretty early in the morning, and was desired by her woman to
walk into her lady's library, till such time as she was in readiness to
receive me. The very sound of a lady's library gave me a great curiosity
to see it; and, as it was some time before the lady came to me, I had an
opportunity of turning over a great many of her books, which were ranged
together in a very beautiful order. At the end of the folios (which were
finely bound and gilt) were great jars of china placed one above another
in a very noble piece of architecture. The quartos were separated from
the octavos by a pile of smaller vessels, which rose in a delightful
pyramid. The octavos were bounded by tea-dishes of all shapes, colours,
and sizes, which were so disposed on a wooden frame, that they looked
like one continued pillar indented with the finest strokes of sculpture,
and stained with the greatest variety of dyes. That part of the library
which was designed for the reception of plays and pamphlets, and other
loose papers, was enclosed in a kind of square, consisting of one of the
prettiest grotesque works that I ever saw, and made up of scaramouches,
lions, monkeys, mandarins, trees, shells, and a thousand other odd
figures in china ware. In the midst of the room was a little japan
table, with a quire of gilt paper upon it, and upon the paper a silver
snuff-box made in the shape of a little book. I found there were several
other counterfeit books upon the upper shelves, which were carved in
wood, and served only to fill up the number, like faggots in the muster
of a regiment. I was wonderfully pleased with such a mixed kind of
furniture as seemed very suitable both to the lady and the scholar, and
did not know at first whether I should fancy myself in a grotto or in a
library.
Upon my looking into the books I found there were some few which the
lady had bought for her own use, but that most of them had been got
together, either because she had heard them praised, or because she had
seen the authors of them. Among several that I examined, I very well
remember these that follow:
Ogilby's _Virgil_. Dryden's _Juvenal_. _Cassandra._ _Cleopatra._
_Astraea._ Sir Isaac Newton's works. _The Grand Cyrus_, with a pin
stuck in one of the middle leaves. Pembroke's _Arcadia_. Locke of
_Human Understanding_; with a paper of patches in it. A
spelling-book. A dictionary for the explanation of hard words.
Sherlock upon Death. _The Fifteen Comforts of Matrimony._ Sir
William Temple's Essays. Father Malebranche's _Search after Truth_,
translated into English. A book of Novels. _The Academy of
Compliments._ Culpepper's _Midwifery_. _The Ladies' Calling._ Tales
in Verse by Dr. D'Urfey: bound in red leather, gilt on the back,
and doubled down in several places. All the Classic authors, in
wood. A set of Elzevirs by the same hand. _Clelia_: which opened of
itself in the place that describes two lovers in a bower. Baker's
_Chronicle_. _Advice to a Daughter._ _The New Atlantis_, with a key
to it. Mr. Steele's _Christian Hero_. A Prayer-book: with a bottle
of Hungary water by the side of it. Dr. Sacheverell's Speech.
Fielding's Trial. Seneca's _Morals_. Taylor's _Holy Living and
Dying_. La Ferte's _Instructions for Country-dances_.
I was taking a catalogue in my pocket-book of these and several other
authors, when Leonora entered.--J. ADDISON. _Spectator_, 37.