There are some books that seem to ask for illustration. Who has handled the three folio volumes which comprise the first edition of Clarendon's 'History of the Rebellion' without feeling that by rights they should contain fine mezzotint portraits of the chief actors in that great drama? But they must be mezzotints, mark you—mere line engravings would be out of place among those bank-note paper leaves with their handsome great-primer type. This question of seemliness, too, must be considered carefully ere we add a single plate to any volume. Not every engraving, however beautiful in design and impression, is at once suitable to every book that treats of the subject it depicts. That the illustrations be contemporary with the text goes without saying. No one would be so foolish as to insert modern 'half-tone' illustrations in a seventeenth-century book.
That heading 'Extra-illustrated,' so dear to certain booksellers, must send a shudder through many of the discerning readers of their catalogues. Books that are extra-illustrated should be avoided by the collector on principle. There is something foolishly egotistical in seeking (by those who have no knowledge of book-production) to 'improve' the work of other men whose business is the making of books. There can be no necessity for it; the author is quite sure to have added the illustrations that are requisite for the volume. It is only books that were published without illustrations that we are justified in attempting to embellish. Illustrations in a book are invariably a question of the author's and publisher's tastes; the cost of their production is not usually an all-important item: it is the setting up of the type, the paper, and the binding that count—not the illustrations.
It was the fashion in the early decades of the last century to issue volumes of engravings suitable for illustrating the works of contemporary writers, such as Byron and Scott: and these illustrations can be used when you have your editions rebound. There is no particular merit about the greater part of them, but they depict incidents described in the text, so at least they are apposite. Each to his taste; our book-hunter for his part needs no second-rate illustrations to help him visualise the glories of Childe Harold or Don Juan; and he has long since confined his Grangerising to the sparing addition of finely engraved portraits to biographical volumes.
FOOTNOTES:
[44] With regard to these cases, the collector will use his own judgment as to whether they be of the 'slip-in' variety, by which means the binding is rubbed every time that he withdraws and inserts his volume; whether such cases be lined with velvet, and roomy enough to obviate this friction; or whether they shall open with a flap at the side.
[45] If you are interested in the pedigrees of your volumes (by which we mean the identification of their previous owners) you will find M. Guigard's 'Nouvel Armorial du Bibliophile,' octavo, Paris, 1890, useful where armorial bindings are concerned. It is an interesting volume, and appeared first of all in four parts (large octavo, Paris), between 1870 and 1872. There are cuts of every coat of arms identified, but these are almost entirely French. Mr. Cyril Davenport's 'English Heraldic Book-stamps' was published in large octavo, in 1909. For early book-plates you must consult the numerous works upon this subject that have appeared in recent years. An excellent series of articles entitled "Books on Book-plates," by F.C.P., appeared in 'The Bookman's Journal and Print Collector' between February and July, 1920 (Nos. 15-18, 20-23, 25, 34, and 40). There is also 'A Bibliography of Book-Plates,' by Messrs. Fincham and Brown, in which the plates are arranged chronologically. The Ex-Libris Society issues a journal, and there are numerous other volumes upon this subject, which you will find mentioned in Mr. Courtney's 'Register of National Bibliography.'
[46] Canto xviii.
