The editor of Notes and Queries (4th Series, vol. IX, p. 443) says, "We are inclined to think the first circulating library in Scotland was in Dunfermline in 1711."
Scotland was ahead of England in the matter of circulating libraries. So far as I can discover, Newcastle-on-Tyne has the honor of starting the first circulating library in England. One Joseph Barber had "lent books on the High Bridge, at the other end of the Flesh Market, in 1746, and now, in 1757, at Amen Corner, near St. Nicholas's Churchyard, he had 1257 volumes on loan. His was the 'old original' library of circulation." In 1757 a rival appeared in the person of William Charnley who placed two thousand volumes at the command of subscribers at twelve shillings a year. (Notes and Queries, 5th Series, vol. VIII, p. 155.)
In 1751 a circulating library was opened in Birmingham by the famous William Hutton, who wrote in his Autobiography, "I was the first who opened a circulating library in Birmingham, in 1751, since which time many have entered the race." He also said, "As I hired out books the fair sex did not neglect my shop." In 1750 there had been opened at Birmingham a book-club for the circulation of books among its members—"probably the oldest book-club in existence," and still flourishing in 1877. The Manchester subscription library dates from 1765, or earlier. (Ibid., 5th Series, vol. VII, p. 452.) The circulating library of Liverpool was established May 1, 1758. The first catalogue is dated November 1, 1758. There were 109 subscribers at five shillings each, and 450 volumes. The centenary of this library was celebrated May 13, 1858. (Ibid. 5th Series, vol. VII, p. 354.) In January, 1761, Mr. Baker, book-seller of Tunbridge Wells, lost his circulating library by fire. By 1770 there were circulating libraries at Settle, Rochdale, Exeter, and doubtless other places. In The Annual Register (p. 207) for 1761 is an interesting note: "The reading female hires her novels from some country circulating library, which consists of about an hundred volumes," which might very well apply to Polly Honeycomb. (Ibid. 7th Series, vol. XII, p. 66.)
When Franklin came to London in 1725 there was not a single circulating library in the metropolis. See Franklin's Autobiography (vol. I, p. 64), and in 1697 the only library in London which approached the nature of a public library was that of Zion College, belonging to the London clergy (Ellis's Letters of Literary Men, p. 245). The exact date of the earliest London circulating library I have not yet ascertained; but according to Southey (The Doctor, ed. Warter, 1848, p. 271) the first set up in London was about the middle of the eighteenth century by Samuel Fancourt. (Buckle: History of Civilization in England, vol. I, p. 393.) Samuel Fancourt was a dissenting minister who went to London about 1730. A library conducted by him at a subscription of a guinea a year was dissolved, Michaelmas, 1745. Between 1746 and 1748 he issued an alphabetical catalogue of Books and Pamphlets belonging to the Circulating Library in Crane Court, in two volumes. In this "Gentlemen and Ladies' Growing and Circulating Library" the initial payment was a guinea and four shillings a year. A subscriber could draw one book and one pamphlet at a time. "He may keep them a reasonable time according to their bigness." This library contained between two and three thousand volumes, only about a tenth being light literature, and nearly half the total contents being on theology. (Dictionary of National Biography, under Fancourt.)
[503] The Adventures of Jack Smart and The History of Miss Betsey Thoughtless are in Colman's list.
[504] The Reward of Constancy (possibly Shebeare's The Happy Pair; or, Virtue and Constancy rewarded, 1771); The Fatal Connexion, by Mrs. Fogarty (1773); The Mistakes of the Heart, by Treyssac de Vergy (1769); The Delicate Distress (1769) and The Gordian Knot (1769), by Mrs. Griffith; The Memoirs of Lady Woodford (1771); Peregrine Pickle, by Smollett (1751); Tears of Sensibility, translated from French by John Murdock (1773); Humphrey Clinker, by Smollett (1771); Sentimental Journey, by Sterne (1768); Roderick Random, by Smollett (1748; eighth ed. 1770); The Innocent Adultery (translation of Scarron's L'Adultère Innocente, in 1722-29 and with later editions); Lord Aimsworth (1773); The Man of Feeling, by Mackenzie (1771). For full comment on these books, and the others in Lydia's list see Major Dramas of Richard Brinsley Sheridan (edited by George Henry Nettleton), Introduction, pp. lxviii-lxxvii.
[506] The new names are Mrs. Behn, Mrs. Manley, Mrs. Centlivre, Mrs. Thomas, Mrs. Rowe, Mrs. Cockburn, Mrs. Pilkington, and Miss Chandler. Ballard (p. vii) gives a list of the ladies who had a reputation for learning, but concerning whom he could get no information. The list is as follows: "Lady Mary Nevil, Lady Anne Southwell, Lady Honor Hay, Lady Mary Wroath, Lady Armyn, Lady Ranelagh, Lady Anne Boynton (famous for her skill in ancient coins, and noble collection of them), Lady Levet, Lady Warner. Gentlewomen: Mrs. Mabilla Vaughan, Mrs. Elizabeth Grimstone, Mrs. Jane Owen, Mrs. M. Croft, Mrs. Emilia Lanyer, Mrs. Makins (who corresponded in the learned languages with Mrs. Maria à Schurman), Mrs. Gertrude More, Mrs. Dorothy Leigh." None of Cibber's additions appear in this list. Apparently Ballard's omission of writers of comedy and fiction would indicate that he did not count them among the learned. The omission of Mrs. Cockburn is less explicable. The five Lives given by both Ballard and Cibber are of the Duchess of Newcastle, Anne Killigrew, Lady Chudleigh, Mrs. Monk, Lady Winchilsea, and Mrs. Grierson.