WARRANT SIGNED BY WARREN HASTINGS, PHILIP FRANCIS, EDWARD WHEELER, AND EYRE COOTE, MAY 31, 1780.
[CHAPTER I]
ON AUTOGRAPH COLLECTING GENERALLY
Autograph collecting in relation to kindred hobbies—The genesis of the autograph—Examples of the alba amicorum of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries—The conscript fathers of autograph collecting—Franks and their votaries—Album specimens and their value—The autograph-hunter and his unconscious victims—Anecdotes of some recent autograph "draws"
There can be no doubt that the handwriting of a man is related to his thought and character, and that we may therefore gain a certain impression of his ordinary mode of life and conduct.—Goethe to Cardinal Preusker.