that book-collectors must well understand their object before they set about it, or they may be as seriously taken in, as the collector of pictures by the Old Masters. To begin, like children, with what is most amusing -namely, the picture-books, we may say that the earliest examples of illustrated books are editions of the Bible, which go by the name of Block-books, and frightful things they are to a lady's eye, but in the estimation of the antiquary beautiful and precious beyond compare. The art of wood-engraving is in so rude a state, and good drawing of the figure so little attended to, that the objects become ludicious from the absurdity of their representation. Some curious volumes of this kind are on "Chiromancy," or the telling of fortunes by the lines on the hand, which member is portrayed on the title-page, followed by the portrait of the author of one of the treatises, Dr. Hartliet, who is kneeling before his patroness, the Duchess of Brunswick, He says, "when a cross is found on the hand it denotes courage and pride of heart, but beware how you carry your thumb folded within the fingers, for it marks a covetous fellow, and one who wishes to live by good means or ill means." For one of these books Earl Spencer gave £100; it is supposed to have been surreptitiously obtained from the Imperial library of Vienna, when the French had possession of the capital. The earliest volume of all illustrated ones was executed in the German language, and printed in 1462; it is the rarest of typographical curiosities, there being only two known copies one in the Royal library of Paris, and another in that of Earl Spencer. It is to the Augsberg and Nuremberg press that we are indebted for most of these graphic embellishments the impressions of Rome and Venice being entirely without ornament. Next to these copies of the Scripture come the Rituals and Missals, and the Liturgies of the various cathedrals, of which those of Salisbury stand pre-eminent. Winkyn de Worde was one of the earliest printers of these in our own country, and a fine quarto copy on vellum still exists, on the margin of which are some strange mysterious rhymes written, which were, no doubt, used as spells in those superstitious ages-as, for instance, "Peter's Brother, where lyest all night? What hast in thy hande? Heauen keys. Broade booke leaues. Open heauen gates, Shutt hell yeates, Euerie childe creep Christ ouer, It is in a missal of the Cathedral of Wurtzburg, in 1481, that we see the first decoration in copper. Bold was the genius that struck out the design of fixing metal types within wooden borders of elaborate ornaments, and thus multiplying a thousand copies whilst the illuminator was decorating one. France was the country where these beautiful productions first appeared; but to Venice it was reserved to adopt a purer style and give a different turn to the ornaments, as the Vallombrosa ritual will testify. The amplitude of the folio page, the size and variety of the types, the lustre of the inks, the tone and substance of the vellum, but, above all, the pure arabesque taste of the decorations combine to produce the most enthusiastic sensations in the book collector. When we reach the sixteenth century we meet with designs of both Albert Durer and Holbein : a fine example of the former celebrated engraver may be found in the prayer-book of Queen Elizabeth, from which time to that of George the Third we seldom find ornamented books of devotion. The pencil of Holbein throws a charm and an interest about a volume by no means rare, "The History of the Old Testament;" but its intrinsic beauty readers it precious in the estimation of the tasteful collector. The text is both in Latin and French; the latter in metre. Among the same class come the Basil books, published at the press of Froben, and, though the engravings are coarsely executed, there is a felicity of invention and a spirit of execution about them which induces collectors to seize every opportunity of enriching their cabinets with them. The title-pages to the earlier editions of Erasmus' Greek Testament are very elaborate, and well deserving attention. Most of these ornaments were designed by Holbein, whilst the "Universal Cosmogony, printed in 1544, is enriched by hundreds of cuts of towns, animals, human beings of every station, portraits of eminent men, giving us a rich harvest of every species of graphic entertainment. Almost all known works before 1462 were printed on vellum, and after that period a few copies of every work were struck off upon the same durable material. These are of course most envied possessions. Some of them are absolutely encased in mail, in a binding of at least three hundred years standing, upon the exterior of which are knobs and projections of brass, which remind you of the coat of a rhinoceros. A Roman missal, on vellum, in large Gothic type, which appears to have been the printer's own choice copy, deposited by him in some monastic library, as a memento for the occupiers of it to "pray for the souls of himself and his family," has been purchased by Lord Spencer. It is preserved in its ancient oaken binding, with the margins of the leaves untrimmed and ungilded, and is considered a matchless treasure. The library at Chatsworth and that of Lord Spencer rival each other in the possession of vellum copies, and are only surpassed by the Royal collection. The art of printing on this material has much retrograded, and the failures have been more numerous than the successful experiments. Much allowance must be made for badly prepared vellum, the white lead which has been used to give it a beautiful uniform tint proves its destruction in a few years, whilst MSS. of a thousand years old exhibit no signs of decay, and may last to the end of the world. 39 Title-pages are unknown in the earliest printed books; the whole of Caxton's are without, and to the year 1480 we seek for them in vain, and it is amusing to the true bibliomaniac to see in the public auction room an uninstructed collector or unfledged antiquary seeking with anxious eye for what never was there, or to read in a bookseller's catalogue the remark" that such a copy appears perfect with the exception the title-page," when it was printed as early as 1470. At first a few simple lines were on the top of the page, then a corinthian façade, and in 1490 we meet with the usual ornament of the author seated at his desk with parchments and writing materials, and his study ornamented with a crucifix, hourclass, &c. About the year 1520 the passion for costly and sumptuous title-pages began to prevail. We find elaborate borders and large central wood-cuts, some issuing from the Venetian presses, of great beauty. These continued in vogue until the copper-plate embellishments of the seventeenth century were introduced. All the great printers distinguished their books by their own device, some of which were curious enough. The late bishop of Ely used to say, "Whenever you see a cat with a mouse on a frontispiece seize upon it, the chances are as three to four it will be curious and valuable," it belongs to the Sessæ press of Venice, whilst the Aldine device is well known on all classical works, the anchor with the dolphin twining round it. Colinæus, the great printer of his time in Paris, chose three rabbits, supporting his cypher under a tree, and the fat hen of Cavellat is worthy of Bewick's pencil. Cyane and Foucher chose the tortoise, wishing their books like it to be stationary in our libraries; and the droll grouping of the frogs of Froschover, the great Zurich printer, is an exhilirating sight, as the text of the books they ornament are well deserving of perusal; the device was evidently chosen as a pun on the name, as is also the device of Apiarius, the Berne printer, being a bear climbing up a hollow tree to extract the honey from it. Henri Etienne, or Stephen, as it is usually Englishified, who was disinherited by his father in 1482 for the crime of having addicted himself to printing, placed over his printing-house the sign of the rabbits. At the door of his house he exposed a copy of each work he published, with the promise of payment of a certain sum to any one who could discover a typographical error in them, even to a comma; so that after all these centuries it is far easier to pick a Chubb's lock than to find an error in Stephens's printing. In passing, we may say that the demolishing pickaxe, which has of late been so freely used in Paris, is on the point of pulling down his old printing-house, in the Rue Saint Jean de Beauvais, near the schools of law and medicine, to the deep regret of the archæologist. It would be impossible to describe the enthusiasm and rivalry which prevails among biblio maniacs when a sale really worth their attention occurs. Perhaps the greatest that ever took place in England was at the sale of the Duke of Roxburghe's library in 1812; for forty-two days was the contest carried on, whilst the shouts of the victors and the groans of the vanquished stunned the quiet spectator: thousands of pounds were realized, and books were sold at a price which they never again fetched. A few friends dining afterwards together, and discussing the price of the Boccaccio, which realized £2200, proposed that they should form a club to commemorate the sale, and to meet on the anniversary the 17th of June. Earl Spencer took the chair, Earl Gower, Lord Morpeth, Sir Egerton Brydges, and fourteen others dined together at the first meeting, and hence sprung the Roxburghe Club, the rule being that each member in turn was yearly to furnish the reprint of some rare old tract or composition-a resolution which has been carried out most years with a few exceptions. One of the strangest of these book-sales was that of the library of Du Perron, which took place in the very busiest and bloodiest period of the French Revolution. The books were knocked down according to their supposed worth in assignats, and it has a ludicrous effect to hear of ninety-one thousand one hundred pieces of paper money being given for a French book, and three hundred and fifteen thousand for a copy of the "Encyclopedie." When Count MacCarthy's collection was brought to the hammer by his representatives in Paris, it was first offered to the Duke of Devonshire, who proposed giving £20,000 for it. This noble sum was rejected, and bitterly they must have repented, the sale by auction only realizing £12,800. Louis the Eighteenth, who was an ardent collector, secured one of the rarest volumes in it, a "Psalmorum Codex," 1457, printed by Fust and Schoiffer, for 12,000 francs, about which the following story is told. A few days previously a young Parisian book-knight called on Mons. de Bure, the auctioneer, and drawing his sword, swore upon it that the "first Psalter" should never quit the country in which it was about to be sold. The result proved most consoling to the feelings of the chivalrous youth, and loud and long were the plaudits in the Hotel de Bouillon when the hammer fell in favour of the King. The beautiful initial letters of this work show the skill attained by the artists on wood at that period. The volume in the Imperial Library at Vienna is considered matchless; but there is a superb copy in the King's Library, procured for his Majesty George the Third, from the Library of the University of Gottingen. It is sumptuously bound in purple velvet, with embossed gold corners and clasps, the title, royal crown, and cypher in solid gold are impressed on the sides, and it is preserved in a blue morocco case. Four hun. dred pounds were given for this book, and the binding cost two hundred more. At this same sale of Count MacCarthy's, the Polyglot Bible of Cardinal Ximenes, upon vellum, being the first printed Greek text of the New Testament, with collations of various Hebrew, Greek, and Chaldaic MSS. came to England, Lord Holland being the fortunate possessor. Brocarius, who printed this valuable work, used to tell his friends that he sent his son to carry it to the Cardinal when he had put the finishing stroke to the last volume. The boy dressed himself in a very elegant suit of clothes, approached Ximenes, and delivered the volume into his hand: "I render thanks to thee, O God," exclaimed the Cardinal, "that thou hast protracted my life to the completion of these biblical labours." And afterwards when conversing with his friends, he often observed, that the surmounting of the various difficulties of his political station did not afford him half the solace which arose from the completion of the Polyglot. He died not many weeks after it was printed. "Where do you see stags?" I asked. "Look at these young shoots, see how the stags' tooth has bitten them: they are destroyed." "And how do you know," said I, "that they are stags and not squirrels ?" "You are not a hunter," said the keeper; "a squirrel bites lower down, and not in the same way." Át the edge of the forest a peasant was digging up his field of potatoes. Make haste, my good man," said the Saxon, "there will be two of you this evening.' "No; there will be three," answered the countryman;" for I shall have my gun and intend to say a few words to the thief." "Take care of him, for he is a solitary one." "Who are you talking of?" I asked, with astonishment." "Of the wild boar, which has rooted up this corner of land." As for the great collector of these days, of whom we have before spoken, M. Libri, the motto of his life is "To sell is to buy, to buy is to sell;" and thus, with the fortune of a private gentleman, he has given himself the enjoyment" of kings. His literary life can be traced by the catalogues of sales that he publishes. In 1847 be sold his magnificent Italian collection, and at the same time gave up his precious collection of MSS. to Lord Ashburnham. In 1848 his books were seized in Paris, giving rise to a lawsuit which has only just been concluded. He then came to England without bringing a single volume with him, yet in 1859 he had collected twelve hundred MSS., seventy of which were of a date previous to the twelfth century, and three thousand volumes richly adorned with their historical bindings. A third sale was announced for 1860, and in the preface he declares he has still twelve thousand volumes, which he denominates his tools. Here, then, are thirty thousand rare, unique, and curious books which he has gathered together in so short a time without leaving London. The question arises, Where are these treasures hidden, and how can we get hold of them? A story comes to my mind which will illustrate the point. Some years ago, when travelling in France, I met with a young man from Saxony, a distinguished botanist, who came expressly for a plant of yellow garlick, which grew only at Fontainebleau, on the thatch of the walls round the pheasantry. I walked with him through the forest. smiling; "but the bur "They are not wise," said he, "to allow the rabbits to inhabit this wood." "I see no rabbits," said I. "Nor I," he replied, rows are at your feet." We met with one of the keepers near some young plantation. "The stags do you great harm here," remarked my companion to him. "Do not speak of it," replied the keeper, "they forbid us to kill them. Yet they eat up everything: the whole neighbourhood is ravaged." "Have you seen him?" "No," said he; laughing at my simplicity; but I am a hunter." Hunter! yes, that is the name that befits the true bibliomaniac. They see, scent, guess at things which a vulgar eye never perceives. They hear that the last of the Antaldi is dead at Pesaro. There were in his possession two manuscripts of the "Divina Commedia ;" an immense price is asked for them, and money is scarce: from the cellar to the garret, too, the house is full of books: but, at whatever cost, they must have the MSS. The papers announce the sale of the Albani library at Rome. There is to be found a vellum copy of the "Council of Trent," printed by Manucius, in 1564. An order is immediately sent to buy this rarity at any price; but the Pope, a real connoisseur in old books, has already secured it for the Vatican. Day and night the English, French, German, Italian catalogues are studied. An amateur will not pass a week without turning into Payne and Foss's to look over those old books which reach us in loads from the continent. Revolutions, death, war, poverty, are enemies which none can escape; and they help to circulate literary treasures which would otherwise be shut up. Three centuries ago Italy had seized upon the remains of antiquity and the wonders of the renaissance. Where are now the libraries of the Medici, the Grimani, the Strozzi, the Spada, the Albani? We must seek them scattered in the possession of the rich English and American collectors, and in the libraries of Paris, Munich, and Berlin. That Sterne was a genuine collector we may feel sure, when we read his description of Mr. Shandy getting a scarce copy of Bruscambille's "Prologues," which describe a kind of amusement in fashion in the time of Louis the Thirteenth. Mr. Shandy, we are told, got his "Prologue on Noses" almost for nothing -that is, for three half-crowns. "There are not three Bruscambilles in Christendom," said the stall-man, "except what are chained-up in the libraries of the curious.", My father flung down the money as quick as lightning, took Bruscambille into his bosom, consult the tastes of others as well as your own hied home from Piccadilly to Coleman-street-seeing that death or accident may at any mowith it, as he would have hied home with a ment throw them into the hands of relatives. treasure, without taking his hand once off from The Earl of Surrey, in one of his sonnets, reBruscambille all the way." A similar work, commends the Bibliomaniac never to exchange "Les Sérées," by Le Sieur de Broncourt du his study for the hymenial chamber; and I will Bouchet, seems to have suggested many of close with an old epigram from a saucy book, Sterne's dissertations: it is very rare and con- entitled "Holborn Drollery," 1673, as piquant sists of a set of conversations held at the petit as graceless. soupers, so fashionable in France in the seventeenth century. A subject for discussion was proposed by the host each evening, and treated with great knowledge and light humour; every conversation concluding with a jest. In conclusion, we must recommend that the passion for book-collecting should be regulated with good sense. Love books as dearly and as fondly as you please, collect them as ardently and incessantly as you may, decorate them with all the taste of a virtuoso, and with all the costliness which a well-filled purse will enable you to bestow on their exteriors, but do not neglect to read them. Collect, too, with judgment, and A scholler newly entred marriage life, Following his studie did offend his wife, I would be such a booke you loue to reade, Marie, (quoth he) t'were best an Almanacke. STRAY THOUGHTS. No. I.-ON COLD WATER. Some time since we were passing through a certain spacious street in a most unfashionable district when we observed a little crowd collected opposite a part of the dead wall which runs all along one side of the aforesaid street. On looking, the object of interest turned out to be a newly-erected drinking fountain, the clear trickling stream from which was eagerly tasted by each of the bystanders, while the metal cup and fittings afforded endless amusement to the ragged gamins congregated on the pavement. Seeing this we (being in an idle and speculative mood, to which our friends and enemies say we are too prone) contrasted, mentally, the condition af the poorest classes in the rural districts with that of those of the modern Babylon. And we here beg to state, before going further, that this paper will be a discursive one, and by no means devoted to the condition of cold water as produced from London drinking fountains, Well then, how different are the facilities of procuring water between the poor dwellers in country-not country towns-and in London. The first have, in most cases, however poor, some sparkling brook babbling through the fields skirting the hedge, crossing the dusty road, purling crystal clear over its pebbles till it empties itself into pond, river, or elsewhere; or it may be that the cottage, humble and mud-walled as it is, is near the banks of a swirling river rushing swiftly through willows and rushes, and of fering from its broad stream, water of the purest in plenty for all household needs. The poor slum-inhabiting, stifled, sweltering inmates of London alley and court have no such privileges, and possess no such gifts of Nature. Every drop of water has to be fetched laboriously from the pump or, worse, to be dipped out of a water-butt containing horrors innumerable. No praise is too great for those who originally carried out the idea of erecting drinking-fountains, and if they have not answered the exaggerated idea of some enthusiasts in preventing intemperance, yet no one can watch one of these fountains for five minutes without seeing the beneficial effect it has and the appreciation it calls forth. But the heading of this essay, by no means confines our remarks to fresh water. Glorious visions of the grey autumn sea come upon us, the rough waves tossing under the first breath of winter, clear and cold, but bracing the glowing form till the muscles are tense as steel. And we may picture also-though a sterner and grander panorama opens now to our viewthe wild December sea, surging and tossing, with its boiling waves topped with white foam, beneath the howling north-east wind, the coastline marked by a line of black rocks, and with the sands crowded by the fishermen, preventivemen, and bystanders, all gazing, in mingled horror and pity, upon the strained, shattered vessel-dismasted, her crew clinging to rigging and bulwark, and nearing every moment the fatal reef. Often the lifeboat succeeds on her glorious errand of saving life, but in many cases the mountains of waves preclude any approach. The despairing cries of the fated crew sound nearer, amid the roar of the wind, and, at last, the ship disappears amid the awestruck silence and manly grief of the rough and brave fellows who only give up their efforts when utterly impracticable. the simple diet, the regularity of hour and food, are great ingredients in restoring nature to her equable tone. deep heather, after grouse, the thirsty pedestrian arrives at the bank of a rippling, sparkling, flower-bordered, grass-laving, tiny rill, and flinging himself down drinks his fill of the refreshing, cooling "drink of Paradise." Of a truth, gentle reader, the highest appreLet us leave these gloomy scenes-which, ciation of cold water is when, after a summer alas, have been lately realities-and digressing, walk through lanes loaded with flowers, with an as we give ourself permission to do in these azure sky above and a blazing sun; or after a papers, think a little on cold water as a beve-long walk, gun on arm, through fragrant kneerage. Intemperance is certainly a great national vice, but it is, we sincerely think, a doubtful question whether the violent diatribes against all liquors that are fermented, are calculated to induce the nation to become water drinkers. Certainly there is a mighty, potent influence in the look of amber ale, clear as topaz, beaded and sparkling. There is, of course, a great deal in the argument that a pledge is necessary for most men in the classes to which total abstinence is recommended, There is great truth in the remark that their minds require some fixed and tangible barrier to contemplate. But, at the same time, the fault we find with the total-abstinence advocates is, that they can never abstain from a sort of self-exaltation, and reprimand and warning for those who are not of their opinion. Cold water, too, is a great feature now-a-days in medical treatment, when so many are bearing grateful testimony to the benefits of hydropathy, and we can easily understand that the splendid baths, the plunges in cold water, the strict rules, And so we can remember the dying soldier, and gentleman, brave, tender, and chivalrous, who lay racked in agony on the field of Zutphen, amid his wounded companions and injured foes; we can picture his friend approaching with the precious cup of cold water, procured at infinite cost and, on seeing which, the maimed soldier lying hard by piteously implores a drink of it, and we can hear Sir Philip Sidney, readily turning his dimming eye from the priceless draught, murmur, "Take it, thy necessity is greater than mine." * And so bring we this humble and discursive paper to an end, trusting our readers may condescend to wile away five minutes on the thoughts and fancies suggested by the common words "COLD Water.' W. R. HARRINGTON GRANGE. CHAP. IX. THE REASON WHY. her head in the pillow; she would like to be there all alone, and be quiet. Would Meg let her? The sun rose and shone over the faded Tears came from the old woman's eyes, but chestnut-tree, and the shadow fell as usual on there were none for Amy. It was not only that the lawn; but Amy slept. There were no traces one sentence of her father's, but words spoken of tears on her cheeks, and she had shed none. not to her but to Meg-cold, passionless words She had gone to bed weary and worn out, of hatred to the name of Vere, and stern inasking no questions, speaking to no one; think-junctions that it may never be mentioned in his ing perhaps she should understand it better by-presence again. and-bye, and believing that the proposed misery was too great and overwhelming ever to happen to her. Meg went in and leaned over the bed; she stooped and kissed the cheek on the pillow; still Amy slept; and in her sleep came back the glorious beauty of the past days. The sun was shining over the park, and birds were singing; there was the scent of flowers in the air, there were flowers in her bosom, Philip's flowers, and with her hand in his she was listening again to the words of fondness and hope on his lips. She awoke. How the brightness faded from her eye, and the cold dead weight fell on her heart! Oh! was it morning-how soon it had come! She would like to turn round again, and bury "Let me alone, Meg. Do let me alone!" "But I can't, Miss Amy. The master—” "Yes, the master!" cried Amy, sitting up. "I forgot. He should tell me why it is, and what Philip has done. I have a right to know that." "But he doesn't think, dear, that you know he was here. He doesn't know (how should he?) that you-Oh now, didn't I warn you about them Veres?" "Don't you say anything against them, Meg." "I won't, dear, I won't. Only get up and try to forget it. I know how hard it is "No, Meg, not if you talk of forgetting. In that case I don't think you do know anything about it. But I should be told what there is against Philip; what they fancy he has done.” |