Classics.
13. Of all the subjects in our list perhaps none comprises volumes of greater beauty and printed with greater distinction than this—the Classics of the Old World. It is a rare field for the scholar to-day, for the time when no library could be considered complete without editions of most of the old masters of Greece and Italy is long past; and there is nothing like the competition nowadays to secure the well-known editions which formerly adorned the shelves of our grandfathers. Not long ago our book-hunter witnessed the sale of a sixteenth-century folio Isocrates, bound in ancient green morocco, for seven and sixpence; and similar volumes are described continually in the modern booksellers' catalogues. There is more scope here for the collection of masterpieces of typography than in any other heading in our list. Aldines, Estiennes, Elzeviers, Plantins, Baskervilles, Barbous—all are within the reach of the most modest purse. You need not trouble to study Dibdin's 'Introduction to the Knowledge of Rare and Valuable Editions of the Greek and Latin Classics': if you are sufficiently fond of immortal books and beautiful printing to make this subject your hobby, your own eyes and hands will guide you in the choice of editions—from the bibliographical standpoint.
Cookery Books.
14. The Collection of Cookery Books offers a wider field for the book-collector's activities than would appear at first sight. Besides the considerable number of works of a purely culinary nature, there are many sources whence we can learn much concerning the dietary and table customs of our ancestors. Caxton's (or rather de Worde's) 'Book of Curtesye' is a primer of good manners for a small boy at table and elsewhere, and it may well find a place, in modern shape, on the shelf beside other volumes on household economy. 'Don't dip your meat in the salt-cellar,' the wise man tells Master Jackie, 'lest folk apoynte you of unconnyngnesse.' He must be careful, also, not to expectorate across the table,
'ne at the borde ye shall no naylis pare
ne pyke your teth with knyf.'
Injunctions that are, perhaps, unnecessary nowadays; but all must agree with the great printer that
'it is a tedyous thynge
For to here a chylde multeplye talkyng.'
Are books on table-manners published nowadays? The latest I remember to have seen is Trusler's 'The Honours of the Table, or Rules for Behaviour during Meals, with the Whole Art of Carving,' which appeared in 1788. It has woodcuts by Bewick, and is a curious and scarce little volume.
Even such unlikely volumes as Dugdale's 'Origines Juridiciales' (folio, London 1680), the Egerton and Rutland Papers, and other volumes of household accounts issued by the learned societies contain menus and long lists of foodstuffs and drinks consumed at various feasts. W. C. Hazlitt's account of some 'Old Cookery Books and Ancient Cuisine' appeared in 12mo in 1886. It has a list of some of the older works. There is also a bibliography of books upon this subject in Dr. A. W. Oxford's 'Notes from a Collector's Catalogue' which appeared in 1909. His 'English Cookery Books to the Year 1850' was published in 1913. You will find a useful paper upon old English cookery in the 'Quarterly Review' for January 1894. M. Georges Vicaire's 'Bibliographie Gastronomique,' a handsome octavo volume with facsimiles, appeared at Paris in 1890.
Then there are such books on dieting as Cornaro's 'Discorsi della Vita Sobria' and Lessius on the Right Course of Preserving Health, both english'd in 1634 and printed at Cambridge in a tiny volume entitled 'Hygiasticon'; also Tryon's 'Way to Health,' Sir Thomas Elyot's 'Castel of Helth,' and other works of this nature. 'The Forme of Cury,' compiled about 1390 by the master cook of Richard ii., was published by Samuel Pegge in 1780; and the 'Libre Cure Cocorum,' about 1440, was issued by the Philological Society in 1862. The 'Boke of Cookery' printed by Pynson in 1500, and Buttes' 'Dyets Dry Dinner,' 1599, you will probably have to go without unless your purse be a deep one; indeed so far as I am aware no duplicate is known of the first-mentioned!
