There are many of smaller size. In fact, there is probably no country so well stocked as the States with libraries of from ten thousand to twenty thousand volumes,—the evidence that they have bought what was to be bought, and have done all that a new people can to participate in the long-hoarded treasures of literature which it is the privilege of the Old World to possess. I know that, especially in the instance of the Astorian Library, the selections of books have been made with great judgment, and that, after the boundaries of the common crowded market were passed, and individual rarities had to be stalked in distant hunting-grounds, innate literary value was still held an object more important than mere abstract rarity, and, as the more worthy quality of the two, that on which the buying power available to the emissary was brought to bear.
The zeal and wealth which the citizens of the States have thrown into the limited field from which a library can be rapidly reaped, are manifested in the size and value of their private collections. A volume, called The Private Libraries of New York, by James Wynne, M.D., affords interesting evidence of this phenomenon. It is printed on large thick paper, after the most luxurious fashion of our book clubs, apparently for private distribution. The author states, however, that "the greater part of the sketches of private libraries to be found in this volume, were prepared for and published in the Evening Post about two years since. Their origin is due to a request on the part of Mr Bigelow, one of the editors of the Post, to the writer, to examine and sketch the more prominent private collections of books in New York."
Such an undertaking reveals, to us of the old country, a very singular social condition. With us, the class who may be thus offered up to the martyrdom of publicity is limited. The owners of great houses and great collections are doomed to share them with the public, and if they would frequent their own establishments, must be content to do so in the capacity of librarians or showmen, for the benefit of their numerous and uninvited visitors. They generally, with wise resignation, bow to the sacrifice, and, abandoning all connection with their treasures, dedicate them to the people—nor, as their affluence is generally sufficient to surround them with an abundance of other enjoyments, are they an object of much pity.
But that the privacy of our ordinary wealthy and middle classes should be invaded in a similar shape, is an idea that could not get abroad without creating sensations of the most lively horror. They manage these things differently across the Atlantic, and so here we have "over" fifty gentlemen's private collections ransacked and anatomised. If they like it, we have no reason to complain, but rather have occasion to rejoice in the valuable and interesting result.
It is quite natural that their ways of esteeming a collection should not be as our ways. There is a story of a Cockney auctioneer, who had a location in the back settlements to dispose of, advertising that it was "almost entirely covered with fine old timber." To many there would appear to be an equal degree of verdant simplicity in mentioning among the specialties and distinguishing features of a collection—the Biographia and Encyclopædia Britannica, Lowndes's Manual, the Quarterly and Edinburgh Reviews, Boyle, Ducange, Moreri, Dodsley's Annual Register, Watt's Bibliotheca, and Diodorus Siculus.
The statement that there is in Dr Francis's collection a "complete set of the Recueil des Causes Célèbres, collected by Maurice Mejan, in eighteen volumes—a scarce and valuable work"—would throw any of our black-letter knight-errants into convulsions of laughter. There are also some instances of perhaps not unnatural confusion between one merely local British celebrity and another, as where it is set forth that in Mr Noyes's collection "there is a fine copy of Sir Robert Walpole's works, in five large quarto volumes, embellished with plates." But under all this inexperience of the ways of the craft as it is cultivated among us, and unconsciousness of such small parochial distinctions as may hold between Sir Robert Walpole, our Prime Minister, and Horace Walpole, the man of letters and trinkets, the book contains a quantity of valuable and substantial matter, both as a record of rich stores of learning heaped up for the use of the scholar, and marvellous varieties to dazzle the eyes of the mere Dibdinite. The prevailing feature throughout is the lavish costliness and luxury of these collections, several of which exceed ten thousand volumes. Where collections have grown so large that, on the principles already explained, their increase is impeded, the owner's zeal and wealth seem to have developed themselves in the lavish enshrining and decorating of such things as were attainable.[52]
The descriptions of a remorseless investigator like this have a fresh individuality not to be found here, where our habitual reserve prevents us from offering or enjoying a full, true, and particular account of the goods of our neighbours, unless they are brought to the hammer,—and then they have lost half the charm which they possessed as the household gods of some one conspicuous by position or character, and are little more estimable than other common merchandise. It would be difficult to find, among the countless books about books produced by us in the old country, any in which the bent of individual tastes and propensities is so distinctly represented in tangible symbols; and the reality of the elucidation is increased by the sort of innocent surprise with which the historian approaches each "lot," evidently as a first acquaintance, about whom he inquires and obtains all available particulars, good-humouredly communicating them in bald detail to his reader. Here follows a sketch—and surely a tempting one—of a New York interior:—
"Mr Burton's library contains nearly sixteen thousand volumes. Its proprietor had constructed for its accommodation and preservation a three-storey fire-proof building, about thirty feet square, which is isolated from all other buildings, and is connected with his residence in Hudson Street by a conservatory gallery. The chief library-room occupies the upper floor of this building, and is about twenty-five feet in height. Its ceiling presents a series of groined rafters, after the old English style, in the centre of which rises a dome-skylight of stained glass. The sides of the library are fitted up with thirty-six oak book-cases of a Gothic pattern, which entirely surround it, and are nine feet in height. The space between the ceiling and the book-cases is filled with paintings, for the most part of large size, and said to be of value. Specimens of armour and busts of distinguished authors decorate appropriate compartments, and in a prominent niche, at the head of the apartment, stands a full-length statue of Shakespeare, executed by Thom, in the same style as the Tam o' Shanter and Old Mortality groups of this Scotch sculptor.
"The great specialty of the library is its Shakespeare collection; but, although very extensive and valuable, it by no means engrosses the entire library, which contains a large number of valuable works in several departments of literature.
"The number of lexicons and dictionaries is large, and among the latter may be found all the rare old English works so valuable for reference. Three book-cases are devoted to serials, which contain many of the standard reviews and magazines. One case is appropriated to voyages and travels, in which are found many valuable ones. In another are upwards of one hundred volumes of table-talk, and numerous works on the fine arts and bibliography. One book-case is devoted to choice works on America, among which is Sebastian Munster's Cosmographia Totius Orbis Regionum, published in folio at Basle in 1537, which contains full notes of Columbus, Vespucci, and other early voyagers. Another department contains a curious catalogue of authorities relating to Crime and Punishment; a liberal space is devoted to Facetiæ, another to American Poetry, and also one to Natural and Moral Philosophy. The standard works of Fiction, Biography, Theology, and the Drama, are all represented.