The Circulating Library—what a revolution was that in popular literature! How this new plant appeared above the earth, where it first budded, where it bore its early fruit—how it grew into a great tree, like that in the old title to Lilly's Grammar, where the apples of knowledge are being gathered by little climbing-boys—would be difficult to trace and to record. There it was—this great economiser of individual outlay for books—in most market-towns at the beginning of the century. The universal adoption of the name is the best proof of the common recognition of the idea. It changed the habits of the old country booksellers. It found them other occupation than keeping a stall in the market-place, as did their worthy forefathers. They dealt no longer in tracts and single sermons. It sent the chap-books into the villages. It made the 'Seven Champions of Christendom' and 'The Wise Masters of Greece' vulgar. It created a new literature of fiction. It banished 'Robinson Crusoe' to the kitchen, and 'The Arabian Nights' to the nursery. It built up great printing-houses in Leadenhall-street; and held out high rewards for rapid composition, at the rate of five pounds per volume, to decayed governesses who had seen the world, and bank-clerks of an imaginative turn of mind. These could produce a wilderness of Italian bandits, with unlimited wealth and beauty, who had won the hearts of credulous countesses, and only surrendered to the hangman when whole armies came out to take them. These could unveil all the mysterious luxuries of great mansions in Grosvenor-square, or of sumptuous hotels in Bond-street. There was ever and anon a "bright particular star" in the Milky Way of popular fiction. But the circulating library went on its own course, whether the empyrean of romance were dim or brilliant. "What have you got new?" was the universal question put to the guardian of the treasures of this recently-discovered world of letters. When the bower-maid of the luxurious fair one, who lolled upon the sofa through a long summer's day, as Gray did when he was deep in Crébillon, came to "change" the book, great sometimes was the perplexity. It was not a difficult task to "change," but the newness was puzzling. The lady and the neat-handed Phillis pursued their studies simultaneously. They did not like "poetry;" they did not like "letters." 'Sir Charles Grandison' was as old and as tiresome as 'Pamela.' 'Tom Jones,' and 'Peregrine Pickle;' they wondered why they were allowed to remain in the catalogue. They had read 'Cœlebs in search of a Wife'—the charming book—but they did not want it again. Perhaps, suggested the bookseller's apprentice, 'The Monk' might do once more. And so the circulating library went on, slow and struggling, till, about 1814, the unlucky desire for "something new" brought down to the little greasy collection, whose delusive numbers of volumes ranged from 1 to 3250, a new novel, with the somewhat unpromising title of 'Waverley, or 'tis Sixty Years since.' At first, the lady upon the sofa, and the counsellor of her studies, could not endure it, for it was full of horrid Scotch. It was often "at home," as the phrase went, for six months of its probation; when, somehow, it was discovered that a new book of wonderful talent had come out of the North. Another and another came, and in a few years the old circulating library was ruined. The Burneys, and Edgeworths, and Radcliffes, and Godwins, and Holcrofts, who had mixed with much lower company upon the librarian's shelves, still held a place. But the Winters in London and Winters in Bath, the Midnight Bells, the Nuns, and the Watch-Towers, retired from business. There was then a new epoch in the circulating-library life. The literature of travels and memoirs timidly claimed a place by the side of the fashionable novel, which asserted its dignity by raising its price to a guinea and a half. The old legitimate stupidity, which did very well before the trade was disturbed, would no longer "circulate." But the names of the producers of the higher fiction were not "Legion." "Something new" must still be had. To meet the market, every variety of west-end authorship was experimented upon. The number to be printed could be calculated with tolerable exactness, according to the reputation of the writer,—and this calculation regulated the payment of copyright, from fifty pounds, and five hundred printed, to the man without a name, up to fifteen hundred pounds, and an impression of three thousand, to "the glass of fashion." But in this department of the commerce of literature,—as it will be in the end with every branch upon which the growth of popular intelligence is operating,—the rubbish is perishable, has perished; the good endureth.
The circulating library is now, in many instances, a real instrument of popular enlightenment. Yet in some of the smaller towns, and in watering-places where raffles have their charm, and a musical performance is patronised in the 'Fancy Repository,' by "audience fit though few"—there the circulating library may be studied in its ancient brilliancy. There, are still preserved, with a paper number on their brown leather backs, and a well-worn bill of the terms of subscription on their sides, those volumes, now fading into oblivion, whence the writers of many a penny journal of fiction are drawing and will still draw their inspiration. Many of these relics of a past age will live over again in shilling volumes with new titles. The heroes and heroines will change their names; the furniture of the apartments in which they utter their vows of love will be modernised; every sentence which in the slightest degree approaches the vulgar will be softened down or obliterated. There is a great deal yet to be done in this way; and the metamorphosis will go on and prosper. In the mean while the circulating libraries, both in London and the provinces, are supporting a higher literature of fiction than those of the past generation; and they find also that there are other volumes almost as attractive as the last new novel. They are doing the same work as the book-clubs. Both these modes of co-operation have had the effect of making the demand for a book that is at once solid and attractive more certain than the old demand by individual purchasers. The certainty of the demand necessarily produces a gradual reduction of price. An average demand is created, resulting from an average of taste in those who belong to book-societies and subscribe to circulating libraries. But these channels for the sale of new books are not materially influenced by lowness of price. Cheapness is greatly influential with the private purchaser; but very many are content with the reading of a new book, through the club or the library, who would never buy it for their own household. This first demand is one of the means by which good books may be cheapened for a subsequent large issue for the permanent home library. In 'The Life of Lackington' there is the following passage:—"I have been informed that, when circulating libraries were first opened, the booksellers were much alarmed; and their rapid increase added to their fears, and led them to think that the sale of books would be much diminished by such libraries. But experience has proved that the sale of books, so far from being diminished by them, has been greatly promoted; as from these repositories many thousand families have been cheaply supplied with books, by which the taste of reading has become much more general, and thousands of books are purchased every year by such as have first borrowed them at those libraries, and, after reading, approving of them, have become purchasers."
One of the first attempts, and it was a successful one, to establish a cheap Book-Club was made by Robert Burns. He had founded a Society at Tarbolton, called the Bachelors' Club, which met monthly for the purposes of discussion and conversation. But this was a club without books; for the fines levied upon the members were spent in conviviality. Having changed his residence to Mauchline, a similar club was established there, but with one important alteration:—the fines were set apart for the purchase of books, and the first work bought was 'The Mirror,' by Henry Mackenzie. Dr. Currie, the biographer of Burns, in recording this fact, says, "With deference to the Conversation Society of Mauchline, it may be doubted whether the books which they purchased were of a kind best adapted to promote the interest and happiness of persons in this situation of life." The objection of Dr. Currie was founded upon his belief that works which cultivated "delicacy of taste" were unfitted for those who pursued manual occupations. He qualifies his objection, however, by the remark, that "Every human being is a proper judge of his own happiness, and within the path of innocence ought to be permitted to pursue it. Since it is the taste of the Scottish peasantry to give a preference to works of taste and of fancy, it may be presumed they find a superior gratification in the perusal of such works." This truth, timidly put by Dr. Currie, ought to be the foundation of every attempt to provide books for all readers. We are learning to correct the false opinions which, for a century or two, have been degrading the national character by lowering the general taste. Those who maintained that taste was the exclusive property of the rich and the luxurious, could not take away from the humble the beauty of the rose or the fragrance of the violet; they could not make the nightingale sing a vulgar note to "the swink'd hedger at his supper;" nor, speaking purely to a question of taste, did they venture to lower the noble translation of the Bible, which they put into the hands of the poor man, to something which, according to the insolent formula of those days, was "adapted to the meanest capacity." A great deal of this has passed away. It has been discovered that music is a fitting thing to be cultivated by the people; the doors of galleries are thrown open for the people to gaze upon Raffaelles and Correggios; even cottages are built so as to satisfy a feeling of proportion, and to make their inmates aspire to something like decoration. All this is progress in the right direction.
In the year 1825 Lord Brougham (then Mr. Brougham), in his 'Practical Observations upon the Education of the People,' explained a plan which has yet been only partially acted upon. "Book-Clubs or Reading Societies may be established by very small numbers of contributors, and require an inconsiderable fund. If the associates live near one another, arrangements may be easily made for circulating the books, so that they may be in use every moment that any one can spare from his work. Here, too, the rich have an opportunity presented to them of promoting instruction without constant interference: the gift of a few books, as a beginning, will generally prove a sufficient encouragement to carry on the plan by weekly or monthly contributions: and, with the gift, a scheme may be communicated to assist the contributors in arranging the plan of their association." Simple in its working as such a plan would appear to be, the instances of these voluntary associations are really few. In Scotland, Lending Libraries and Itinerating Libraries have, in some districts, been established successfully; but in England, Lending Libraries are scarcely to be found, except in connexion with schools, or under the immediate direction of the minister of a parish or of a dissenting congregation. In these cases, we fear, comes too frequently into action the desire, laudable no doubt, to promote "the interest and happiness of persons in this situation of life." They are not permitted to choose for themselves. The best books of amusement are kept out of their sight; and they contrive to get hold of the worst. The timidity which insists upon supplying these libraries with pattern books renders the libraries disagreeable, and therefore useless.[29]
[27] 'Autobiography of an Artisan.' By Christopher Thomson. 1847.
[28] 'Biographia Literaria,' vol. i. p. 60, ed. 1817.
[29] See page 309.
CHAPTER IV.
Continued dearness of Books—Useful Knowledge Society—Modern Epoch of Cheapness—Demand and Supply—The Printing-machine—The Paper-machine—Revival of Woodcutting.