These illustrations are cited to guard against the too common error of supposing that we have in the numerous American catalogues that exist, even putting them all together, any full bibliography of the titles of American books. While it cannot be said that the lacunae or omissions approach the actual entries in number, it must be allowed that books are turning up every day, both new and old, whose titles are not found in any catalogue. The most important books—those which deserve a name as literature, are found recorded somewhere—although even as to many of these, one has to search many alphabets, in a large number of volumes, before tracing them, or some editions of them.
One principal source of the great number of titles of books found wanting in American catalogues, is that many books were printed at places remote from the great cities, and were never announced in the columns of the press at all. This is especially true as to books printed toward the close of the 18th century, and during the first quarter of the 19th. Not only have we no bibliography whatever of American issues of the press, specially devoted to covering the long period between 1775 and 1820, but multitudes of books printed during that neglected half-century, have failed to get into the printed catalogues of our libraries. As illustrations we might give a long catalogue of places where book-publication was long carried on, and many books of more or less importance printed or reprinted, but in which towns not a book has been produced for more than three-quarters of a century past. One of these towns was Winchester, and another Williamsburg, in Virginia; another was Exeter, New Hampshire, and a fourth was Carlisle, Pa. In the last-named place, one Archibald Loudon printed many books, between A. D. 1798, and 1813, which have nearly all escaped the chroniclers of American book-titles. Notable among the productions of his press, was his own book, A History of Indian Wars, or as he styled it in the title page, "A selection of some of the most interesting narratives of outrages committed by the Indians in their wars with the white people." This history appeared in two volumes from the press of A. Loudon, Carlisle, Pa., in 1808 and 1811. It is so rare that I have failed to find its title anywhere except in Sabin's Bibliotheca Americana, Field's Indian Bibliography, and the Catalogue of the Library of Congress. Not even the British Museum Library, so rich in Americana, has a copy. Sabin states that only six copies are known, and Field styles it, "this rarest of books on America," adding that he could learn of only three perfect copies in the world. A Harrisburg reprint of 1888 (100 copies to subscribers) is also quite rare.
Continuing the subject of American bibliography, and still lamenting the want of any comprehensive or finished work in that field which is worthy of the name, let us see what catalogues do exist, even approximating completeness for any period. The earlier years of the production of American books have been partially covered by the "Catalogue of publications in what is now the United States, prior to 1776." This list was compiled by an indefatigable librarian, the late Samuel F. Haven, who was at the head of the Library of the American Antiquarian Society, at Worcester, Mass. It gives all titles by sequence of years of publication, instead of alphabetical order, from 1639 (the epoch of the earliest printing in the United States) to the end of 1775. The titles of books and pamphlets are described with provoking brevity, being generally limited to a single line for each, and usually without publishers' names, (though the places of publication and sometimes the number of pages are given) so that it leaves much to be desired. Notwithstanding this, Mr. Haven's catalogue is an invaluable aid to the searcher after titles of the early printed literature of our country. It appeared at Albany, N. Y., in 1874, as an appendix [in Vol 2] to a new (or second) edition of Isaiah Thomas's History of Printing in America, which was first published in 1810. In using it, the librarian will find no difficulty, if he knows the year when the publication he looks for appeared, as all books of each year are arranged in alphabetical order. But if he knows only the author's name, he may have a long search to trace the title, there being no general alphabet or index of authors. This chronological arrangement has certain advantages to the literary inquirer or historian, while for ready reference, its disadvantages are obvious.
While there were several earlier undertakings of an American bibliography than Haven's catalogue of publications before the American revolution, yet the long period which that list covers, and its importance, entitled it to first mention here. There had, however, appeared, as early as the year 1804, in Boston, "A Catalogue of all books, printed in the United States, with the prices, and places where published, annexed." This large promise is hardly redeemed by the contents of this thin pamphlet of 91 pages, all told. Yet the editor goes on to assure us—
"This Catalogue is intended to include all books of general sale printed in the United States, whether original, or reprinted; that the public may see the rapid progress of book-printing in a country, where, twenty years since, scarcely a book was published. Local and occasional tracts are generally omitted. Some of the books in the Catalogue are now out of print, and others are scarce. It is contemplated to publish a new edition of this Catalogue, every two years, and to make the necessary additions and corrections; and it is hoped the time is not far distant, when useful Libraries may be formed of American editions of Books, well printed, and handsomely bound.
Printed at Boston, for the Book sellers, Jan., 1804."
The really remarkable thing about this catalogue is that it was the very first bibliographical attempt at a general catalogue, in separate form, in America. It is quite interesting as an early booksellers' list of American publications, as well as for its classification, which is as follows: "Law, Physic, Divinity, Bibles, Miscellanies, School Books, Singing Books, Omissions."
The fact that no subsequent issues of the catalogue appeared, evinces the very small interest taken in bibliographic knowledge in those early days.
This curiosity of early American bibliography gives the titles of 1338 books, all of American publication, with prices in 1804. Here are samples: Bingham's Columbian Orator, 75 cts.: Burney's Cecilia, 3 vols. $3: Memoirs of Pious Women, $1.12: Belknap's New Hampshire, 3 vols. $5: Mrs. Coghlan's Memoirs, 62½ cts.: Brockden Brown's Wieland, $1: Federalist, 2 vols. $4.50: Dilworth's Spelling Book, 12½ cts.: Pike's Arithmetic, $2.25.
The number of out-of-the-way places in which books were published in those days is remarkable. Thus, in Connecticut, we have as issuing books, Litchfield, New London and Fairhaven: in Massachusetts, Leominster, Dedham, Greenfield, Brookfield, and Wrentham: in New Hampshire, Dover, Walpole, Portsmouth, and Exeter: in Pennsylvania, Washington, Carlisle, and Chambersburg: in New Jersey, Morristown, Elizabethtown, and Burlington. At Alexandria, Va., eight books are recorded as published.