Finally Sotheby’s received a package accompanied by a letter, painstakingly written in an illiterate hand, with small i’s throughout, and guiltless of punctuation. He was sending this copy, he wrote, because a friend was foolish enough to think it might be worth something. Of course it wasn’t. He had inherited it from his people, and his people were poor. They couldn’t have had anything valuable to leave him. If, as he believed, it was worthless, would they please throw it away, and not bother to return it, or waste money answering him? I don’t know what his direct emotional reaction was when they replied saying his old book was worth at least £900—more than $4000—and that they would place it in their next sale. Perhaps he was stunned for a time. Anyway, weeks passed before they received a rather incoherent reply. I happened to be in London when it was sold, and I paid £2500—about $12,000—for the copy. I later learned that the barber was swamped for months with letters from old friends he had never heard of before, each with a valuable book to sell him.
As collectors grow older, they find it is better to buy occasionally and at a high price than to run about collecting tuppenny treasures. There is seldom any dispute about the worth of a rare book. Many collectors, however, feel collecting has a value other than monetary; it keeps men young, and as the years pass it proves to be a new type of life insurance.
The late Mr. W. A. White of New York, until his death a few months ago, was as vigorous at eighty-three as he had been thirty years before. He combined a quality of youth with his extraordinary knowledge of books and literature. His wonderful library would take away the load of years from a Methuselah. Even to read over the partial list of his treasures, which was recently published, would have a distinctly rejuvenating effect. Mr. Henry E. Huntington was another successful man who practically gave up his business interests to devote himself to the invigorating pastime of book collecting. He collected so rapidly that no young man could follow in his steps! Even my uncle Moses grew younger and younger as he sat year after year surrounded by books.
Rare books are a safe investment; the stock can never go down. A market exists in every city of the world. New buyers constantly crop up. The most ordinary, sane, and prosaic type of business man will suddenly appear at your door, a searching look in his eye, a suppressed tone of excitement in his voice. Like the Ancient Mariner, he takes hold of you to tell his story—for he has suddenly discovered book collecting. And if it happens to be at the end of a very long day, you feel like the Wedding Guest, figuratively beating your breast the while you listen. He returns again and again, enthralled by this new interest which takes him away from his business. If he is wealthy, he already may be surfeited with luxuries of one sort or another; but here is something akin to the friendship of a charming and secretive woman. He takes no risk of becoming satiated; there is no possibility of being bored; always some new experience or unexpected discovery may be lurking just around the corner of a bookshelf.
II
A MILLION DOLLAR BOOKSHELF
One of my early memories concerns a cold winter night in Philadelphia. I was a little boy of thirteen. Uncle Moses and I had been together undisturbed the entire evening, for the weather was so bitterly cold not one of his book-loving cronies dared venture out. With the shop door locked and the shutters tightly drawn, we sat close to the little wood stove, in the dim light of an oil lamp, while I listened, fascinated, to endless tales about books—how this one was lost and that one found. To this handsome old patriarch books were more vital than people; with ease he held my boyish imagination until I was almost afraid to glance back at the shadowed shelves.
He told me the story of a man in England, a collector, who heard of some Shakespeare folios in Spain; of how, after months of inquiries and exciting adventures, he at last journeyed to a castle in the Pyrenees. There he found an ancient Spanish grandee leaning forward before a great fireplace, feeding the fire with torn bits of paper on which, to his horror, he beheld English printing; how he tore them from the old man’s fingers—the remains of a second Shakespeare folio he had sought and found too late! As Uncle Moses spoke, he arose to throw casually some sheets of an old Pennsylvania Journal into the stove, while I watched, tense and frightened for fear they, too, might be of value!
At last, as the clock in Independence Hall struck midnight, we felt our way down the dark narrow stairs to the street. In his hand Uncle Moses clasped a cherished volume of the first edition of Fielding’s Tom Jones, to read when he reached home. The uneven sidewalks were dangerously glazed with ice; as we crept unsteadily toward the corner we were relieved to see a lonely carriage passing, and hailed it. The streets were even worse than the sidewalks, and the horse went his way skiddingly. We came to a bridge which shone like a polished mirror in the moonlight. We were halfway across when suddenly the horse lurched, and both Uncle Moses and I were thrown forward. In the confusion Uncle Moses dropped his precious book. Out it went, slithering along the icy way. I started to climb down after it, but was stopped by a firm hand.
Slowly Uncle Moses got out, walked uncertainly forward. He had not gone two steps before he lost his balance. As he fell I cried aloud in alarm and the driver turned, amazed. Up Uncle Moses got, and down he went again; yet with each fall he came nearer and nearer his book, which lay open face downward in the frozen gutter. At last he reached it and, after securely placing it in his overcoat pocket, started the perilous way back. But he had learned the trick; instead of trying to walk, he crouched down on all fours, and, dignified dean of booksellers that he was, crawled cautiously toward the carriage. Suddenly the sight of him there struck me as being the funniest thing I had ever seen! The glassy bridge, the unreal light, and statuesque Uncle Moses telescoping like a huge caterpillar toward me! I snickered, then burst out laughing. The old driver followed suit, and our rude guffaws echoed across the bridge, through the deserted streets. Uncle Moses’ dark eyes snapped as he reached the carriage.