The Library of William Congreve
[ INTRODUCTION]
When William Congreve died in 1729 he left a collection of books which his old friend and publisher, Jacob Tonson, described (in a letter preserved at the Bodleian) as “genteel & well chosen.” Tonson thought so well of the collection that he urged his nephew, then his agent in London, to purchase Congreve’s books. But Congreve had willed them to Henrietta, the young Duchess of Marlborough, who was much concerned with keeping intact (as she wrote in her will) “all Mr. Congreaves Personal Estate that he left me” in order to pass it along to her youngest daughter Mary. This daughter, said by gossip to have been Congreve’s daughter also, married the fourth Duke of Leeds in 1740, and thus Congreve’s books eventually found their way to Hornby Castle, chief seat of the Leeds family in Yorkshire.
There apparently most of Congreve’s books remained until about 1930, when the eleventh Duke of Leeds sold his English estates and authorized Sotheby’s to auction off “a Selected portion of the Valuable Library at Hornby Castle.” Among the 713 items advertised for sale on June 2, 3, and 4, 1930, were ten books containing the signature of William Congreve. These ten, along with a few others that have been discovered here and there with Congreve’s name on the title page, and nine books published by subscription with Congreve’s name in the printed list of subscribers, made a total of some thirty-odd books known to have been in Congreve’s library. These, we may presume, were but a small part of the Congreve books which had been incorporated with the Leeds family library in 1740.
[ Finding and Identifying Congreve’s Book List and His Books]
Among the voluminous papers of the Leeds family now stored in the British Museum, the Public Record Office, and several other depositories in England are at least a half-dozen manuscript lists or catalogues of Leeds books. In one list from the middle of the eighteenth century appear a few of the books known to have been in Congreve’s library. The same is true of lists dated 1810 and 1850. But it is impossible to use any of these to determine exactly which of the books had once been Congreve’s. Fortunately another manuscript list proves to be not a combination of Congreve and Leeds books but a separate catalogue of Congreve’s private library. This list, herewith printed, was found by the editor in an English county depository, the Yorkshire Archaeological Society in the City of Leeds.
Let us see why we may accept this list as Congreve’s and not simply another catalogue of Leeds family books—as the librarian of the Society had classified it. In the first place, it was found among the Leeds papers, in one of the sixteen boxes of manuscripts brought away from Hornby Castle shortly before it was torn down about 1930. Among the same papers, interestingly enough, is a copy of the marriage settlement (on the original parchment) whereby Mary Godolphin brought to the Leeds family the books which she had inherited through her mother from Congreve. The list was just where a Congreve document might have been expected. In fact, the list was discovered incidentally while the Leeds papers were being searched as the most promising place to find Congreve letters. Not a single letter to or from Congreve was to be found, perhaps because the gossip to the effect that Mary was the natural daughter of Congreve had caused the family to destroy or mutilate documents bearing his name. Congreve’s copy of Terence (Number 595 in the list) is a good illustration. On the title page the signature “Will: Congreve” was once entirely blotted out by the same ink that wrote “Leeds” at the side. But the two centuries that have since passed have caused the Leeds ink to fade and thus show very distinctly the clear, black signature of the dramatist. As for Congreve’s 44–page manuscript book list, evidently it was too useful to destroy—too valuable a record of the fine collection acquired by the Leeds family. So the list was kept, but the identifying title at the head of the list was crossed out except for its opening word “Bibliotheca.” Although the name following that word is illegible for the average reader, one who knows what to look for can still trace out “Gul:mi Congreve, Armigeri” (see frontispiece).
We do not, however, need to depend on this reading to prove that the manuscript lists the books of William Congreve, Esquire. All the proof needed is to be found in the list itself. The 659 items bear dates between 1515 and 1728, with fourteen entries for 1728, the last year of Congreve’s life. The list includes every one of the works, and the exact edition of it, for which Congreve is known to have subscribed, such as Rowe’s translation of Lucan’s Pharsalia (1718) and Bononcini’s Cantate e Duetti (1721). Furthermore it includes the identical edition of each book said by the Sotheby catalogue for the Leeds Sale of 1930 to bear the signature of Congreve.
But the most convincing proof that the list could have belonged only to Congreve is provided by three quarto volumes, each with Congreve’s signature on the title page, bound together as one volume. This volume, as described by the Sotheby catalogue for the Leeds Sale, was made up of (1) Dryden’s Of Dramatick Poesie, 1684; (2) Horace’s Art of Poetry, made English by the Earl of Roscommon, 1684; and (3) The Rehearsal, 1687. In other words, the three separate quartos had been specially bound together to form a unique volume, one to be found only in Congreve’s library. This same unique volume appears as item Number 406 in the manuscript list, where it is described as one of the “Miscellanies bound together,” consisting of “Dryden’s Essay on Dram. Poetry, Horace’s Art of Poetry by ye E. of Roscommon, and the Rehearsal”—the identical three quartos described in the Sotheby catalogue.