Books, like those who gave them birth, are of all conditions; but from the collector's point of view they may be divided conveniently into five classes. To the First Class belong those volumes which are described by booksellers and auctioneers as 'fine copies.' Ever since their publication they have been in the possession of wealthy men, often peers, and (sometimes like their owners!) have passed their lives for the most part undisturbed amid luxurious surroundings. They are invariably richly bound, often in historic bindings, and are clean and fresh inside. Frequently they are sumptuous works and presentation copies, and they always command high prices. In a word, they are aristocrats among books. They are not necessarily rare volumes, though frequently they are large-paper copies, and for the true collector they do not offer so much attraction as the Second Class, in which we place those books that are more eagerly sought after. These are generally rare books, such as incunabula and the higher class English literature of the seventeenth century, and are to be found in the libraries of wealthy collectors who are also learned men. They are always well bound and in good condition, though sometimes they have their headlines shaved, occasionally they are slightly imperfect, or have been cleaned and repaired. But they are always desirable books, and evoke spirited bidding whenever they appear in the auction-room.
Class Three comprises the great army of what may be termed 'middle-class books.' They are bound usually in half-bindings, when they are not in the publisher's cloth, and are good, clean, sound, copies of such works as county histories, antiquarian books, sets of the learned societies' publications and of 'standard authors.' They are such stable and solid books as you will usually find in the libraries of the well-to-do middle classes. In short they are gilt-edged securities, and command a steady price in the market.
To Class Four may be assigned the volumes contained in the average second-hand bookseller's shop in this country. They are the ὃι πολλοί among books, and for the most part they include the more frequent and more modern English works. Usually they are quite desirable copies, though frequently they lack a portrait or other plate, sometimes they have a torn or mounted title-page, or other imperfection. They are generally in cloth or calf bindings which are almost invariably somewhat decrepit, being either rubbed or perished, or cracked at the joints. They are dusty and rather unkempt, and fox-marks are common, for such volumes have passed through many hands and have not always been accorded the care that is due to good books. But it is here that one comes across books 'in the original boards uncut,' and, if expense be no object to you, you may often raise such purchases to a higher class.
Books in Class Five are the outcasts of the book-world, being those decrepit volumes which stack the bookstalls and barrows in the larger towns. They are the weedings of auction sales and shops, books that are not worth cataloguing by the dealer. Like human beings they have drifted through life with all its vicissitudes, knowing many masters and earning the gratitude of none. And so at length, deprived even of a home, they find their way into the streets, where they are soon reduced to wreckage.
At first sight it would seem that they owe their situation to their quality, both intrinsic and extrinsic—that they are valueless either as literature or as specimens of book-production, or that they are imperfect or odd volumes. In many cases this may be true, but in general it is not so. The wrecks of handsomely produced books of high-class literature are common on the bookstalls and barrows, as all collectors of modest means are aware. They owe their situation chiefly to inconsiderate handling and to the carelessness of their successive owners.
As to the practice of inserting illustrations in books that are published without them, 'Grangerising,' as it is called, it is perhaps best left alone. At first sight there appears to be small harm in providing, let us say, a volume of travels or the description of a town with an appropriate engraved frontispiece, or adorning your biography of So-and-so with a portrait. But the temptation to overstep the bounds of seemliness is so great that it is seldom the collector stops at a mere frontispiece. In most cases the Grangerite soon loses his self-control, and develops an acute mania for embellishing his volume with all and every print upon which he can lay his hands, apposite in the slightest degree to the subject of the book. Every year the sale-rooms witness these monstrosities. Biographies issued in a single volume are 'extended' ('rended asunder' would be a better term) to fifteen or twenty volumes by the insertion of hundreds of engravings depicting every place mentioned in the text and every man or woman that the subject of the biography ever met. I have seen an octavo volume multiplied into twenty-five folio ones in this fashion, the leaves being inlaid to suit the size of the huge portraits and views stuffed into the disjointed sections of the wretched book. Nor is it only engravings that are used. Play-bills, lottery-tickets, tradesmen's advertisements, autograph letters, maps, charts, broadsides, street ballads, bills even, all are grist for the Grangerite's mill.
It is a singularly futile hobby, and it is certainly a pernicious form of bibliomania, for it is responsible for the destruction of many good books. Whether its devotee imagines that any one is ever going to wade through his twenty monstrosities, turning, perhaps, six illustrations between page and page of text, we have not discovered. His completed labours form a compilation about as valuable as a scrap-book. If it were possible to gather into one volume, or rather portfolio, every portrait, let us say, of a certain celebrity that has ever been published, one would possess a valuable storehouse for reference purposes; and such a volume, from its completeness, would be invaluable in the British Museum. But these limits are too narrow for the true Grangerite. He desires a wider field of action. So he embarks upon a task which he can never hope to complete. Though he labour all his life there will always be some one or more engravings that he has failed to secure; and so far from being 'invaluable,' his collection becomes merely of passing interest. As a book it is, of course, grotesque.
The fate of most of these collections is probably the same. So long as the binding remains in good condition they are ensured a niche on some neglected shelf; but once the marks of age or wear and tear manifest themselves their fate is sealed. They come speedily into the hands of those booksellers who deal also in prints, and beneath such ruthless hands the labour of years is undone in a few minutes. At least it is pleasant to think that the poor pages, separated for so many years, come together again if only for a few hours before they reach the paper-mill!
Whether the sober-minded collector whose pride is the well-being of his books is justified in adding a frontispiece and, say, half-a-dozen good engravings to a book that he appreciates, is a moot question. Doubtless the correct view is that books should not be meddled with by amateur book-producers, that both publisher and author know best what is most fitting for the volume they produce, that any book which has been tampered with internally in any way becomes a monster and is to be avoided. But this brings up again the old question, 'May we not do what we like with our own volumes?'
Personally I am of opinion that the judicious and extremely moderate adornment of certain books is justified by the result. There is no doubt that the insertion in an unillustrated volume of travel of, let us say, six engraved plates depicting scenes mentioned in the text, adds a charm to the volume and enhances both its appearance and the pleasure of its perusal. Similarly the addition of an authentic portrait to a biography certainly lends an added interest, whilst the addition of a map is often of the greatest assistance to the reader. But that books should be mutilated, torn apart, and stuffed with play-bills, lottery-tickets, and the like, no sane book-lover will admit.