| I. | Deucalion and Pyrrha repeopling the world. FromOvid’s Metamorphoses, Paris, 1767 | Frontispiece |
| TO FACE PAGE | ||
| II. | An author (Caxton?) presenting a book to Margaretof Burgundy. Fifteenth century engraving inserted inthe Chatsworth copy of the Recuyell of the Historyes ofTroye | [1] |
| (From the plate made for the Bibliographical Society’s editionof Mr. Seymour De Ricci’s Census of Caxtons.) | ||
| III. | The “Bona Inspiratio angeli contra vanam gloriam.”From a smaller version of the Ars Moriendi. Block-bookfrom the Lower Rhine, c. 1465 | [26] |
| IV. | Leaf 3a of a fragment of the Doctrinale of AlexanderGallus. One of the so-called “Costeriana” | [32] |
| V. | Beginning, with printed capital, of the Rationale DiuinorumOfficiorum of Gulielmus Duranti. Mainz, Fust andSchoeffer, 1459 | [44] |
| VI. | Leaf 7b of the first book printed at Cologne, Cicero, DeOfficiis, Ulrich Zel, not later than 1466 | [60] |
| The space left in the sixth line from the foot stands for thewords ab ostentatione, which the printer apparently could notread in his manuscript. The word vacat at the end was insertedto show that the space in the last line was accidental and thatnothing had been omitted. | ||
| VII. | Leaf 41a of Cicero’s Rhetorica, Venice, Nicolas Jenson,1470, showing spaces left for a chapter heading andcapital | [84] |
| VIII. | Part of leaf 4a, with woodcut, from the Geschicht vondem seligen Kind Symon of Tuberinus. Augsburg,Günther Zainer, about 1475 | [100] |
| IX. | Woodcuts of Saracens and Syrians from Breidenbach’sSanctae Peregrinationis in montem Syon atque in montemSinai descriptio. Mainz, Erhard Reuwich, 1486 | [114] |
| X. | Woodcut on leaf 1b of the Egloga Theoduli. Leipzig,Conrad Kachelofen, 1489 | [116] |
| XI. | Page (sig. H 8 verso) from the Psalterium Beatae MariaeVirginis of Nitschewitz, showing the Emperor Frederickand his son Maximilian. From a press at theCistercian Monastery at Zinna, c. 1493 | [118] |
| XII. | The Harrowing of Hell, with text, from leaf 4a of theBelial of Jacobus de Theramo. Haarlem, Bellaert, 1484.(Size of the original, 7¼″ × 5″) | [120] |
| XIII. | Woodcut of the Betrayal. From leaf 14b of the Meditationesopra la Passione del Nostro Signore attributedto S. Bonaventura. Venice, Geronimo di Sancti, 1487.(Size of original, 6¾″ × 5¼″) | [124] |
| XIV. | Woodcut, De Atheniensibus petentibus regem, illustratingFable xxii. in the Aesop printed at Naples, by FrancescoTuppo, 1485 | [126] |
| XV. | Woodcut of Lorenzo Giustiniano preceded by a crucifer,from his Della vita religiosa. Venice, 1494 | [130] |
| XVI. | Page with woodcut of the Procession to Calvary, fromthe Meditatione sopra la Passione del Nostro Signoreattributed to S. Bonaventura. Florence, Ant. Miscomini,c. 1495 | [138] |
| XVII. | Titlepage of La Festa di San Giovanni. Florence, Bart. diLibri, c. 1495 | [140] |
| XVIII. | Leaf 5a, with woodcut of Death seizing an Archbishop anda Chevalier, from the Danse Macabre. Paris, Gui Marchant,1491. (Size of original 8¾″ × 6¼″) | [144] |
| XIX. | Leaf 2a, with woodcut of Adam and Eve, from a Bibleen Francoys. Paris, Antoine Vérard, about 1505. (Sizeof original, 9¾″ × 7″) | [150] |
| XX. | Page (sig. C 6 verso), with woodcut of the Massacre of theInnocents, from the Grandes Heures. Paris, AntoineVérard, about 1490. (Size of original, 77⁄8″ × 5¼″) | [152] |
| XXI. | Page (sig. U 7 verso) from the edition of Terence, printedby J. Trechsel at Lyon, 1493 | [160] |
| XXII. | Titlepage from the Improbratio Alcorani of Ricoldus.Seville, Stanislaus Polonus, 1500 | [162] |
| XXIII. | Hroswitha presenting her plays to the Emperor Otto I, leaf4b of the Opera Hrosvite. Nuremberg, Sodalitas Celtica,1501 | [180] |
| XXIV. | Titlepage of Jornandes De rebus Gothorum. Augsburg,1515 | [186] |
| XXV. | Page (leaf 246b) of a Missale Romanum, printed at Veniceby Gregorius de Gregoriis, 1518 | [194] |
| XXVI. | Title-cut from Les dix premiers livres de l’Iliaded’Homère, Prince des poètes, traduictz en vers François,par M. Hugues Salel. Paris, Jehan Loys for VincentSertenas, 1545 | [200] |
| XXVII. | Page from the Fifteen Oes. Westminster, Caxton,about 1490 | [204] |
| XXVIII. | First page of text from the first edition (left incomplete)of Tyndale’s New Testament. Cologne,1525 | [224] |
| XXIX. | Part of sig. K 5 recto, with woodcut of Christ raisingthe Centurion’s Daughter, from the SpeculumVitae Christi of S. Bonaventura. Westminster,W. Caxton, about 1488 | [250] |
| XXX. | Titlepage of Bishop Fisher’s Funeral Sermon onHenry VII. London, W. de Worde, 1509 | [254] |
| XXXI. | Woodcut of the translator presenting his book to theDuke of Norfolk, from Alexander Barclay’s versionof Sallust’s Jugurtha. London, R. Pynson,about 1520 | [256] |
| XXXII. | Portrait of the Author, from John Heywood’sThe Spider and the Flie. London, T. Powell, 1556 | [260] |
| XXXIII. | Woodcut of Queen Elizabeth hawking, fromTurberville’s The Booke of Faulconrie, 1575 | [264] |
| XXXIV. | Engraving of Christ in a mandorla from Bettini’sMonte Santo di Dio. Florence, Nicolaus Laurentii,477. (Size of original, 10″ × 7″) | [268] |
| XXXV. | Last page of preface, giving the arms of the Bishopof Würzburg, from the Würzburg Agenda.Würzburg, G. Reyser, 1482 | [270] |
| XXXVI. | Titlepage of the Dialogus of Amadeus Berrutus.Rome, Gabriel of Bologna, 1517 | [274] |
| XXXVII. | Engraved portrait of the Author by Theodore deBry after J. J. Boissard, from the Emblemata ofDenis Le Bey. Frankfort, De Bry, 1596 | [280] |
| XXXVIII. | Page 22 from the Hieroglyphikes of the Life of Manby Quarles, the engraving by W. Marshall, London,1638 | [286] |
| XXXIX. | Page, with engraving after Eisen, from Dorat’sLes Baisers, La Haye et se vend à Paris, Lambert,1770 | [292] |
| XL. | Engraving by W. W. Rylands after Samuel Wale,from Walton’s Compleat Angler. London, T. Hope,1760 | [296] |
| Engraving of an Author, possibly CAXTON Presenting a Book to Margaret, Duchess of Burgundy, prefixed to the Chatsworth copy of the ‘Recuyell.’ |
FINE BOOKS
CHAPTER I
COLLECTORS AND COLLECTING
From the stray notes which have come down to us about the bibliophiles of the later Roman Empire it is evident that book-collecting in those days had at least some modern features. Owing to the abundance of educated slave-labour books were very cheap, almost as cheap as they are now, and book-collectors could busy themselves about refinements not unlike those in which their successors are now interested. But in the Middle Ages books were by no means cheap, and until quite the close of the fourteenth century there were few libraries in which they could be read. Princes and other very wealthy book-buyers took pleasure in possessing finely written and illuminated manuscripts, but the ruling ideals were mainly literary and scholastic, the aim (the quite right and excellent aim) being to have the best books in as many subjects as possible. After printing had been invented the same ideals continued in force, the only difference being that they could now be carried out on a larger scale. Libraries like those formed in the sixteenth century by Archbishop Cranmer and Lords Arundel and Lumley, or that gathered in France by the historian De Thou, were essentially students’ libraries, and the books themselves and the catalogues of them were often classified so as to show what books had been acquired in all the different departments of human knowledge. Even in the sixteenth century, when these literary ideals were dominant, we find some examples of another kind. In Jean Grolier, for instance, we find the book-lover playing the part, too seldom assumed, of the discriminating patron of contemporary printing and bookbinding. Instead of collecting more old books than he could find time to read, Grolier bought the best of his own day, but of these sometimes as many as four or five copies of the same work that he might have no difficulty in finding one for a friend; and whatever book he bought he had bound and decorated with simple good taste in Venice or at home in France. It would be an excellent thing if more of our modern collectors, instead of taking up antiquarian hobbies, were content to follow Grolier’s example. Books always look best when clad in jackets of their own time, and this in the future will apply to the books of the twentieth century as much as to any others. Moreover, there is more actual binding talent available in England just now than at any previous time, and it is much to be desired that modern Groliers would give it scope, not in pulling about old books, but in binding beautifully those of our own day.
Grolier found a modest imitator in England in the person of Thomas Wotton, but with some at least of the Elizabethan book-lovers the havoc wrought in the old libraries by the commissioners of Henry VIII and Edward VI provoked an antiquarian reaction which led them to devote all their energies to collecting, from the unworthy hands into which they had fallen, such treasures of English literary and bookish art as still remained. Putting aside John Leland who worked (to what extent and with what success is not quite clear) for Henry VIII, Matthew Parker, Archbishop of Canterbury, was the earliest of these antiquaries, to the great benefit of the libraries of Lambeth Palace and of Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, though as to how he came by his books perhaps the less said the better. Parker was soon followed by Sir Robert Cotton, whose success in gathering books and documents illustrating English history was so great that his library was sequestered and very nearly altogether taken from him, on the plea that it contained state papers which no subject had a right to possess. Owing to the carelessness and brutality of the previous generation, Cotton’s opportunities were as great as his zeal in making use of them, and at the cost of his fortune he laid the foundations of a national library. Humbler men imitated him without being able to secure the same permanence for their collections, more especially Humphrey Dyson, a notary, who seems to have acquired early printed books and proclamations, with the same zeal which Cotton devoted to manuscripts. Many of his treasures passed into the hands of Richard Smith, the Secondary of the Poultry Compter, but at his sale they were scattered beyond recall, and the unity of one of the most interesting of English collections was thus unkindly destroyed. Both these men, and some others of whom even less is known, worked with a public aim, and already Sir Thomas Bodley had gone a step further by founding anew the University Library at Oxford on lines which at once gave it a national importance. This it preserved and developed for over a century and a half, and has never since lost, though no national help, unfortunately, has ever been given it, save the right already conceded by the Stationers’ Company, of claiming a copy of any new English book offered for sale.
Bodley’s munificent donation marked an epoch in the history of English book-collecting because its tendency was to make private book-collecting of the kind which was then admired incongruous and even absurd. When there were no public libraries open to scholars, for a great man to maintain a splendid library in his own house and allow students to read in it was worthy of Aristotle’s μεγαλόψυχος, the man who does everything on a scale that befits his dignity. But in proportion as public collections of books and facilities for obtaining access to them are increased, the preservation of a library on a large scale in a private house, where none of the inmates have any desire to use it, becomes an easy and justifiable object of satire. A man without literary instincts who inherits a fine library is indeed in a parlous state, for if he keeps it he is as a dog in the manger, and if he sells it he is held up to opprobrium.