By-ways in Book-land: Short Essays on Literary Subjects

BY-WAYS IN BOOK-LAND
Short Essays on Literary Subjects
Wm. Davenport Adams
AUTHOR OF ‘DICTIONARY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE,’ ETC.
‘ Excursusque breves tentat. ’ ‘Georgics,’ iv. 194.
LONDON ELLIOT STOCK, 62, PATERNOSTER ROW 1888
TO MY FATHER, W. H. DAVENPORT ADAMS, THIS LITTLE VOLUME Is Affectionately Inscribed.
In the following pages, the writer for the most part deals with small subjects in an unelaborate manner. He leaves the highways of literature, and strays into the fields and lanes, picking here a flower and there a leaf, and not going far at any time. There is no endeavour to explore with system, or to extend any excursion beyond a modest ramble. The author wanders at haphazard into paths which have attracted him, and along which, he hopes, the reader may be willing to bear him company.

ne is for ever hearing enough and to spare about old books and those who love them. There is a whole literature of the subject. The men themselves, from Charles Lamb downwards, have over and over again described their ecstasies—with what joy they have pounced upon some rare edition, and with what reverence they have ever afterwards regarded it. It is some time since Mr. Buchanan drew his quasi-pathetic picture of the book-hunter, bargaining for his prize,
‘With the odd sixpence in his hand, And greed in his gray eyes;’
having, moreover, in his mind’s eye as he walked