Now the moral is that only tall Elzevirs are beautiful, only tall Elzevirs preserve their ancient proportions, only tall Elzevirs are worth collecting. Dr. Lemuel Gulliver remarks that the King of Lilliput was taller than any of his court by almost the breadth of a nail, and that his altitude filled the minds of all with awe. Well, the Philistine may think a few millimetres, more or less, in the height of an Elzevir are of little importance. When he comes to sell, he will discover the difference. An uncut, or almost uncut, copy of a good Elzevir may be worth fifty or sixty pounds or more; an ordinary copy may bring fewer pence. The binders usually pare down the top and bottom more than the sides. I have a ‘Rabelais’ of the good date, with the red title (1663), and some of the pages have never been opened, at the sides. But the height is only some 122 millimetres, a mere dwarf. Anything over 130 millimetres is very rare. Therefore the collector of Elzevirs should have one of those useful ivory-handled knives on which the French measures are marked, and thus he will at once be able to satisfy himself as to the exact height of any example which he encounters.
Let us now assume that the amateur quite understands what a proper Elzevir should be: tall, clean, well bound if possible, and of the good date. But we have still to learn what the good dates are, and this is matter for the study and practice of a well-spent life. We may gossip about a few of the more famous Elzevirs, those without which no collection is complete. Of all Elzevirs the most famous and the most expensive is an old cookery book, “‘Le Pastissier François.’ Wherein is taught the way to make all sorts of pastry, useful to all sorts of persons. Also the manner of preparing all manner of eggs, for fast-days, and other days, in more than sixty fashions. Amsterdam, Louys, and Daniel Elsevier. 1665.” The mark is not the old “Sage,” but the “Minerva” with her owl. Now this book has no intrinsic value any more than a Tauchnitz reprint of any modern volume on cooking. The ‘Pastissier’ is cherished because it is so very rare. The tract passed into the hands of cooks, and the hands of cooks are detrimental to literature. Just as nursery books, fairy tales, and the like are destroyed from generation to generation, so it happens with books used in the kitchen. The ‘Pastissier,’ to be sure, has a good frontispiece, a scene in a Low Country kitchen, among the dead game and the dainties. The buxom cook is making a game pie; a pheasant pie, decorated with the bird’s head and tail-feathers, is already made. [12]
Not for these charms, but for its rarity, is the ‘Pastissier’ coveted. In an early edition of the ‘Manuel’ (1821) Brunet says, with a feigned brutality (for he dearly loved an Elzevir), “Till now I have disdained to admit this book into my work, but I have yielded to the prayers of amateurs. Besides, how could I keep out a volume which was sold for one hundred and one francs in 1819?” One hundred and one francs! If I could only get a ‘Pastissier’ for one hundred and one francs! But our grandfathers lived in the Bookman’s Paradise. “Il n’est pas jusqu’aux Anglais,” adds Brunet—“the very English themselves—have a taste for the ‘Pastissier.’” The Duke of Marlborough’s copy was actually sold for £1 4s. It would have been money in the ducal pockets of the house of Marlborough to have kept this volume till the general sale of all their portable property at which our generation is privileged to assist. No wonder the ‘Pastissier’ was thought rare. Bérard only knew two copies. Pietiers, writing on the Elzevirs in 1843, could cite only five ‘Pastissiers,’ and in his ‘Annales’ he had found out but five more. Willems, on the other hand, enumerates some thirty, not including Motteley’s. Motteley was an uncultivated, untaught enthusiast. He knew no Latin, but he had a flair for uncut Elzevirs. “Incomptis capillis,” he would cry (it was all his lore) as he gloated over his treasures. They were all burnt by the Commune in the Louvre Library.
A few examples may be given of the prices brought by ‘Le Pastissier’ in later days. Sensier’s copy was but 128 millimetres in height, and had the old ordinary vellum binding,—in fact, it closely resembled a copy which Messrs. Ellis and White had for sale in Bond Street in 1883. The English booksellers asked, I think, about 1,500 francs for their copy. Sensier’s was sold for 128 francs in April, 1828; for 201 francs in 1837. Then the book was gloriously bound by Trautz-Bauzonnet, and was sold with Potier’s books in 1870, when it fetched 2,910 francs. At the Benzon sale (1875) it fetched 3,255 francs, and, falling dreadfully in price, was sold again in 1877 for 2,200 francs. M. Dutuit, at Rouen, has a taller copy, bound by Bauzonnet. Last time it was sold (1851) it brought 251 francs. The Duc de Chartres has now the copy of Pieters, the historian of the Elzevirs, valued at 3,000 francs.
About thirty years ago no fewer than three copies were sold at Brighton, of all places. M. Quentin Bauchart had a copy only 127 millimetres in height, which he swopped to M. Paillet. M. Chartener, of Metz, had a copy now bound by Bauzonnet which was sold for four francs in 1780. We call this the age of cheap books, but before the Revolution books were cheaper. It is fair to say, however, that this example of the ‘Pastissier’ was then bound up with another book, Vlacq’s edition of ‘Le Cuisinier François,’ and so went cheaper than it would otherwise have done. M. de Fontaine de Resbecq declares that a friend of his bought six original pieces of Molière’s bound up with an old French translation of Garth’s ‘Dispensary.’ The one faint hope left to the poor book collector is that he may find a valuable tract lurking in the leaves of some bound collection of trash. I have an original copy of Molière’s ‘Les Fascheux’ bound up with a treatise on precious stones, but the bookseller from whom I bought it knew it was there! That made all the difference.
But, to return to our ‘Pastissier,’ here is M. de Fontaine de Resbecq’s account of how he wooed and won his own copy of this illustrious Elzevir. “I began my walk to-day,” says this haunter of ancient stalls, “by the Pont Marie and the Quai de la Grève, the pillars of Hercules of the book-hunting world. After having viewed and reviewed these remote books, I was going away, when my attention was caught by a small naked volume, without a stitch of binding. I seized it, and what was my delight when I recognised one of the rarest of that famed Elzevir collection whose height is measured as minutely as the carats of the diamond. There was no indication of price on the box where this jewel was lying; the book, though unbound, was perfectly clean within. ‘How much?’ said I to the bookseller. ‘You can have it for six sous,’ he answered; ‘is it too much?’ ‘No,’ said I, and, trembling a little, I handed him the thirty centimes he asked for the ‘Pastissier François.’ You may believe, my friend, that after such a piece of luck at the start, one goes home fondly embracing the beloved object of one’s search. That is exactly what I did.”
Can this tale be true? Is such luck given by the jealous fates mortalibus ægris? M. de Resbecq’s find was made apparently in 1856, when trout were plenty in the streams, and rare books not so very rare. To my own knowledge an English collector has bought an original play of Molière’s, in the original vellum, for eighteenpence. But no one has such luck any longer. Not, at least, in London. A more expensive ‘Pastissier’ than that which brought six sous was priced in Bachelin-Deflorenne’s catalogue at £240. A curious thing occurred when two uncut ‘Pastissiers’ turned up simultaneously in Paris. One of them Morgand and Fatout sold for £400. Clever people argued that one of the twin uncut ‘Pastissiers’ must be an imitation, a facsimile by means of photogravure, or some other process. But it was triumphantly established that both were genuine; they had minute points of difference in the ornaments.
M. Willems, the learned historian of the Elzevirs, is indignant at the successes of a book which, as Brunet declares, is badly printed. There must be at least forty known ‘Pastissiers’ in the world. Yes; but there are at least 4,000 people who would greatly rejoice to possess a ‘Pastissier,’ and some of these desirous ones are very wealthy. While this state of the market endures, the ‘Pastissier’ will fetch higher prices than the other varieties. Another extremely rare Elzevir is ‘L’Illustre Théâtre de Mons. Corneille’ (Leyden, 1644). This contains ‘Le Cid,’ ‘Les Horaces,’ ‘Le Cinna,’ ‘La Mort de Pompée,’ ‘Le Polyeucte.’ The name, ‘L’Illustre Théâtre,’ appearing at that date has an interest of its own. In 1643–44, Molière and Madeleine Béjart had just started the company which they called ‘L’Illustre Théâtre.’ Only six or seven copies of the book are actually known, though three or four are believed to exist in England, probably all covered with dust in the library of some lord. “He has a very good library,” I once heard some one say to a noble earl, whose own library was famous. “And what can a fellow do with a very good library?” answered the descendant of the Crusaders, who probably (being a youth light-hearted and content) was ignorant of his own great possessions. An expensive copy of ‘L’Illustre Théâtre,’ bound by Trautz-Bauzonnet, was sold for £300.
Among Elzevirs desirable, yet not hopelessly rare, is the ‘Virgil’ of 1636. Heinsius was the editor of this beautiful volume, prettily printed, but incorrect. Probably it is hard to correct with absolute accuracy works in the clear but minute type which the Elzevirs affected. They have won fame by the elegance of their books, but their intention was to sell good books cheap, like Michel Lévy. The small type was required to get plenty of “copy” into little bulk. Nicholas Heinsius, the son of the editor of the ‘Virgil,’ when he came to correct his father’s edition, found that it contained so many coquilles, or misprints, as to be nearly the most incorrect copy in the world. Heyne says, “Let the ‘Virgil’ be one of the rare Elzevirs, if you please, but within it has scarcely a trace of any good quality.” Yet the first edition of this beautiful little book, with its two passages of red letters, is so desirable that, till he could possess it, Charles Nodier would not profane his shelves by any ‘Virgil’ at all.