A Splendid History of Ownership

Ex-lib with all the markings. Covers detached. Text block split.  Not what I would call collectible.  But then I collect books formerly owned by the person who donated this very book to the library.  And she was not the original owner. The inscriptions written and the bookplates pasted on its pages speak volumes about this book's history of ownership.

J. O.  Halliwell-Phillipps (1820-1889), the author of this book, was the Shakespeare expert of his time, writing over five hundred books and articles about Shakespeare. This book, The Visits of Shakespeare's Company of Actors to the Provincial Cities and Towns of England, was years in the making. For parts of twenty summers, Halliwell-Phillipps toured England, searching the corporate records of seventy cities and towns for notices of visits of Shakespeare's Company of Actors. In the preface to the book, he notes that Shakespeare was not the company's manager. Halliwell-Phillipps merely used the term, "Shakespeare's Company of Actors," to identify the company of actors to which William Shakespeare belonged.

Here are the corporate records for Shewsbury:

The book itself was printed "for Private Circulation and for Presents only," a statement which could be unique in the book world.

I could find no other book with that statement printed on its title page. Another book by Halliwell-Phillipps, printed in London the same year, however, contains the statement, "For Special Circulation and for Presents only," on its title page.

Halliwell-Phillips was known for limiting the number of copies of his Shakespearean research that were printed in order to make the books more collectible. Here is one such listing from Justin Winsor's Halliwelliana: A Bibliography of the Publications of James Orchard Halliwell-Phillips, published in 1881:

I don't know how many copies of The Visits of Shakespeare's Company of Actors to the Provincial Cities and Towns of England were printed in 1887, but there are currently three copies for sale on the web, two of which are listed at reasonable prices. (Update: Feb 16, 2014.  Maybe I don't realize how popular my blog is; all three 1887 copies have been sold and numerous pods are now listed on abebooks).

Halliwell-Phillipps presented this copy of the book to the Rev. J. W.  Ebsworth (1824-1908) in April 1887.  His inscription on the half-title page reads:

The Rev. J. W.  Ebsworth
With the Compiler's kind regards,
Hollingbury Copse,
Brighton,
April, 1887.

If Halliwell-Phillipps was the resident Shakespeare expert of his time, J. W.  Ebsworth was the authority on ballads. He edited both the Bagford Ballads and the Roxburghe Ballads for the Ballad Society, and edited several ballads and plays for the New Shakspere Society, both societies of which he was a member.   In 1880, Ebsworth wrote the Introduction to the William Griggs facsimile edition of Shakespeare's Midsummer Night's Dream and dedicated the work to his friend, J. O.  Halliwell-Phillipps.

On Feb. 28, 1907, Ebsworth put his library up for auction with the London auction house, Puttick & Simpson. He was disappointed in the sale: 559 lots sold for a measly sum of £521 8s 6d.

A second inscription in the book, this one written on the rear free endpaper by A. K. S., reads like a bookseller's description:

Very small edition, privately printed.
J. W.  Ebsworth's copy, presentation copy to him
from J. O.  Halliwell-Phillipps.
Tipped in loose is an autograph letter of J. O.
Halliwell-Phillipps to Mr. Ebsworth.

A. K. S.

 Written near the bottom left-hand corner of this endpaper is what could be the word "Sale," along with the number "41." I have no clue about the number but the word could refer to the auction sale.  A. K. S. could have been a bookseller who acquired the book at the Puttick & Simpson auction.

 I researched the 1906 edition of James Clegg's International Directory of Booksellers and the list of "Principal Second-hand Booksellers in the United Kingdom Who Publish Catalogues," which is included in J. H. Slater's Book Collecting:  A Guide For Amateurs, London, 1892, but did not readily identify a bookseller with the initials, A. K. S. in either book.


The autograph letter no longer accompanies this book.  But in my research, I uncovered a letter written by Halliwell-Phillipps to Ebsworth on March 28, 1887.  John Collins Francis (1838-1916) printed the gist of this letter in his book,  Notes by the Way: With Memoirs of Joseph Knight and Joseph Woodfall Ebsworth, London, 1909:

As mentioned before, Halliwell-Phillips gave Ebsworth a copy of his book in April 1887.  If this letter is the very letter mentioned in the second inscription,  Halliwell-Phillipps may have given Ebsworth a copy of his book in recognition of Ebsworth's recent assistance concerning the ballad.  And John Collins Francis, the publisher of The Athenaeum, may have been the next owner of Ebsworth's copy of The Visits of Shakespeare's Company of Actors to the Provincial Cities and Towns of England.  There are, however, no marks of provenance in the book identifying him as one of the owners.  As stated in Notes by the Way, published after Ebsworth's death,  Francis was already in possession of the March 28, 1887 letter. Later in Notes by the Way Francis states he was in possession of Ebsworth's manuscripts.  The manuscripts were not included in the 1907 auction of Ebsworth's library.  And, while it is possible that Ebsworth did not insert this particular letter into his copy of The Visits of Shakespeare's Company of Actors to the Provincial Cities and Towns of England, he normally inserted autograph letters into presentation copies of books.   Book-Prices Current, Vol XXI contains an abbreviated listing of 66 of the 559 lots, three of which were presentation copies from other authors. Ebsworth inserted autograph letters in all three of them. The Visits of Shakespeare's Company of Actors to the Provincial Cities and Towns of England was not identified in this abbreviated listing.  I suspect either Ebsworth withheld the book from the auction or John Collins Francis acquired both book and autograph letter from "A.K.S.,  the unidentified bookseller.

There are no "what if's" about the identity of the next owner of the Ebsworth copy of The Visits of Shakespeare's Company of Actors to the Provincial Cities and Towns of England.  He is the Shakespeare actor, Edward Hugh Sothern (1859-1933).

There is, however, a question of when he acquired the Ebsworth's copy of this book.  E.H. Sothern, as he was known, was the leading Shakespeare actor of his time.  Sothern arrived in London on April 3, 1907, shortly after the sale of Ebsworth's library (Feb. 28, 1907).  Sothern was co-starring with the actress, Julia Marlowe (1865-1950), in a series of plays to be performed in England beginning April 15, 1907.    But E. H. Sothern may not have acquired Ebsworth's copy of The Visits of Shakespeare's Company of Actors to the Provincial Cities and Towns of England during this tour in 1907.  He married Julia Marlowe in London on Aug 16, 1911, which would have been the earliest date he could have pasted their bookplate on the front pastedown of the book.  And if John Collins Francis was an unrecorded owner, Sothern may not have acquired the Ebsworth's copy of this book until after Francis's death in 1916.

E. H. Sothern continued to play Romeo and Hamlet and all the other leading male roles, while his wife Julia played Juliet and all the other leading female roles until she retired in 1924 due to poor health.  After E.H. Sothern's acting career waned, he  gave dramatic recitals and lectures until his death in October 1933.

During one of these lectures, it is possible that E.H. Sothern may have crossed paths with the next owner of  the Ebsworth-Sothern copy of The Visits of Shakespeare's Company of Actors to the Provincial Cities and Towns of England: C. F. Tucker Brooke (1883-1946).  Tucker Brooke, as he was known, pasted his Ex Libris bookplate near the top of the front free endpaper of the book.

 Tucker Brooke was one of the first students to be awarded a Rhodes Scholarship.    In fact, all three recorded owners were in England at the same time in April, 1907:  J. W. Ebsworth in Ashworth, E. H. Sothern in London, and Tucker Brooke in Oxford.

Tucker Brooke was the Shakespeare authority of his time, teaching at Yale from 1909 until 1946. He published numerous books about Shakespeare and several about Christopher Marlowe.   Brooke was the founder and one of the editors of the Yale Shakespeare series.  Although he did not believe in the authorship theory that Christopher Marlowe was Shakespeare, he firmly believed that Marlowe was the original author of the second and third parts of King Henry VI.

I am most familiar with the next owner of the Ebsworth-Sothern-Brooke copy of The Visits of Shakespeare's Company of Actors to the Provincial Cities and Towns of England, having written two blog posts about her and her books:  "Mary Hyde and the Unending Pursuit" in 2008 and "A Virtual Tour of My Mary Hyde Collection"in 2012. Her toad bookplate is pasted on the front free endpaper of this book below the bookplate of Tucker Brooke.

In the early to mid 1940s, Mary Hyde (1912-2003) was still collecting Elizabethan drama, while her husband Donald F. Hyde (1909-1966) was creating an impressive Samuel Johnson Collection.  In her essay, "A Library of Dr. Samuel Johnson," first published in the May 1960 issue of Vassar Alumnae Magazine,  and reprinted in Mary Hyde Eccles: A Miscellany of Essays and Address, by the Grolier Club in New York  in 2002, she wrote:

Despite the influence of the Newton Sale, I continued to collect Elizabethan quartos, several of the plays that I had treated in my book of the 1600-1605 productions, including one star, the 1611 Hamlet.  I also could not resist, though I did not know exactly where to put it, Professor Tucker Brooke's working library of some four thousand volumes! 

The Newton Sale referred to is the Parke-Bernet Galleries auction of the A. Edward Newton Collection of Books and Manuscripts conducted in April, May, and October of 1941.  Newton had a Samuel Johnson Collection second only to that of R. B. Adam.   And the Hydes significantly improved their own Samuel Johnson Collection with their purchases from the Newton Sale.

The book of 1600-1605 productions Mary Hyde refers to is an expansion of the thesis for her doctorate awarded by Columbia University in 1947, Playwriting for Elizabethans 1600-1605,  first published by Columbia University in 1949, and reprinted by Octagon Books in New York in 1973.

While researching for her doctorate, Mary Hyde had access to the Shakespeare and Elizabethan quartos belonging to  A. S. W. Rosenbach and Carl H. Pforzheimer.  And with Rosenbach's help, she assembled "a small but significant collection of Shakespeare and Elizabethan quartos, including the 1611 Hamlet.  This collection was later sold at Christie's in 2004 with prices realized of $1,867,092; the 1611 Hamlet was not sold at the auction, but was sold to a private party afterwards.

Interestingly, one of the books sold at the Christie's auction, lot #84, was formerly owned by Edward Hugh Sothern and Julia Marlowe Sothern, albeit in better condition than Visits of Shakespeare's Company of Actors to the Provincial Cities and Towns of England.

And there was one very rare book formerly owned by Tucker Brooke in lot #5, Lord Burghley's provenance adding to its value.

Mary Hyde purchased Tucker Brooke's library en bloc shortly after his death in June 1946.  At the time, the gun room served as the library at Four Oaks Farm, and it was filled with their ever-growing Samuel Johnson Collection.  But in  "The Guest Book" chapter of Four Oaks Farm,  privately printed in Somerville, New Jersey in 1967, Mary Hyde reveals that George Knapp, the award-winning gardener of Four Oaks Farm,  also had carpentry skills, and built bookshelves  to house the Tucker Brooke Collection in the attic.  The room then became known as the Tucker Brooke Library.

 The term "working library" best describes the Tucker Brooke Library, most of the books being "scholarly works" rather than "collectibles."  In fact, the Tucker Brooke Collection is not identified in the Four Oaks Farm companion book,  Four Oaks Library,  as one of the collections in the Four Oaks Library.  The acquisition and disposition of the Tucker Brooke Collection evidently were not considered to be significant events because they were not identified in "Mary Hyde Eccles:  A Chronology," located in the preliminary pages of Mary Hyde Eccles:  A Miscellany of Her Essays and Addresses, published by the Grolier Club in 2002.

There is, however, a folder (#2505) in the Mary Hyde Eccles Papers shelved off-site at the Harvard Depository and dated December 1969 which contains photographs of "the moving of the Tucker Brooke Library."  I believe this is when Mary Hyde donated a substantial portion of the Tucker Brooke Collection to a library named after a very dear friend of hers: Arthur Houghton (1906-1990).   But if you're thinking the Houghton Library at Harvard University, you are wrong!  I'm referring to "the other Houghton Library," the Arthur A. Houghton, Jr. Library, Corning Community College, in Corning, New York.

The Gift Bookplate of the Arthur A. Houghton, Jr. Library is pasted on the verso of the front free endpaper.  Note:  1957 is the year the College was created, and not when the gift was received.

The Hydes first met Arthur Houghton in November 1940 shortly after their arrival in New York from Detroit.  At the time, Houghton, a rare book collector himself, was Curator of the Rare Book Collection of the Library of Congress.   Arthur Houghton was President of the Shakespeare Association of America from 1949 to 1956, and remained on the Advisory Board while Mary Hyde was President in the early 1960s.

Arthur Houghton, an executive with Corning Glass Works and its subsidiary, Steuben Glass, actually had two libraries named after him.   A graduate of the Harvard Class of 1929, Houghton paid for the construction of a library at Harvard to house its rare book collections and manuscripts in a separate building.  The Houghton Library at Harvard opened in 1942.  In 1960, Arthur Houghton and Corning Glass Ware donated 273 acres of land and $2,225,000 for the construction of a Spencer Hill campus for Corning Community College.  And the library named after him,  the Arthur A. Houghton, Jr. Library, opened in May, 1964.

The gift of the Tucker Brooke Collection to the Arthur A. Houghton Library appears to have been conducted without fanfare or publicity.  The books were gradually absorbed into the library stacks.  There are dates ranging from 11-05-70 to 10-19-72 written in the gutter of the page after the title page in the books I acquired from the library.  I suspect these are the dates the books from the Tucker Hyde Collection were absorbed into the library.  The Ebsworth/Sothern/Brooke/Hyde copy of Visits of Shakespeare's Company of Actors to the Provincial Cities and Towns of England was absorbed into the Houghton Library on 8-27-71.

And so I gladly add this ex-lib book with all its markings, and all its splendid history of ownership to My Sentimental Library Collection.

The Collector and The Collected:Two Typophiles From New York

There are two typophiles from New York in my library: the Collector and the Collected. One was born in Rochester in 1918. The other died in Rochester in 1991. One sold printing equipment and supplies. The other ran two printing firms, one of which belonged to his father. One collected printing presses and books about printing. The other wrote a bibliography of books about printing. One was a witness in a hearing of the Committee on Un-American Activities in the 1950s (he sold printing equipment to the Communist Party). The other was Director of the Printing and Publishing Division of the Department of Commerce in the 1950s. One sold his antique press collection to the Canadian National Museum of Science and Technology in the early 1970s. The other sold his printing equipment company in 1966, and became a graphics arts consultant. One moved to California in the early 1970s. The other moved back to Rochester after he retired. One was a member of the Roxburghe Club and the Book Club of California. The other was a member of the Typophiles, the Goudy Society, and the Grolier Club. Who is the Collector? And who is the Collected?

The Collector is the author of an article about a miniature book exhibit which is reprinted in the pamphlet below.

A biographical note in the pamphlet above mentions that Alan Dietch became a collector in 1956. He sold his library in 1999, two years before he died. In the forward to the catalog of his library below, the cataloger writes, "Alan has decided to pass on his collection so that other enthusiasts and collectors will experience the same enjoyment he had in assembling this important history."

If one diligently researches the archives on the PBA Galleries website, one can find all 531 lots of the catalog of Alan Dietch's library, as well as a list of the prices realized.

I have two books from Alan Dietch's library, neither of which is listed in the library catalog.

Edwin H. Carpenter, Jr. inscribed this copy to Alan Dietch:

Horace Hart inscribed this copy to Alan Dietch.

And Alan Dietch inserted a wad of Hartiana inside the book.

Alan Dietch is the Collector
and
Horace Hart is the Collected.


In his Nov 26, 1957 letter to Dietch, Lee Augustine, a fellow collector of books on the history of printing, "introduces" Horace Hart to Alan Dietch, but incorrectly identifies the title of Hart's bibliography.

Dietch sees the above newspaper article about the souvenirs given at the Goudy Centennial Dinner, and queries Horace Hart about obtaining them.

Hart responds and sends Dietch the keepsake, souvenir, and some information about monotype.

In his April 20, 1966 letter to Hart, Dietch tells Hart he has copies of Hart's bibliography as well as Hart's Valhalla series.
Interesting! Hart didn't inscribe the copy I have until Oct 10, 1969. Did Dietch have two copies of Hart's book?
Dietch's copy of the Valhalla series is listed in the PBA catalog.

For thirty years, from December, 1965 to December 1995, Alan Deitch collected clippings of listings of both the limited edition and the trade edition of Bibliotheca Typographica from various bookseller catalogs.

Dietch had two identical Christmas 1987 clippings of Hart's book, A Bibliography of the History of Printing in the Library of Congress, and retained the newspaper clipping announcing the availability of volume two of the work.

Horace Hart, the Collected, died in Rochester on January 24, 1991. And Alan Dietch collected what obituaries he could find.

Alan Dietch, the Collector, died in San Francisco on July 10, 2001.

Elegant Extracts About Books, Booklovers, And Libraries

If there is one thing that a book-collector loves more than acquiring books,
it is talking about them.
Harry B. Smith,
A Sentimental Library

Mine has been a most enjoyable endeavor this month. From my library shelves, I am pulling down handfuls of books, and laying them in my lap as I relax in my library chair. I am slowly turning page after page of book after book, looking for passages which please me, and which, I hope, will please you, for I am gathering them and posting them here for you to read at your leisure. So sit down in your favorite chair, relax, and enjoy.

What magic there is for the book-lover in that word 'library'! Does it not instantly conjure up a vision of happy solitude, a peaceful seclusion where we may lie hidden from our fellow-creatures, an absence of idle chatter to distract our thoughts, and countless books about us on either hand? (Allen 31).
FROM: The Book-Hunter At Home by P. B. M. Allen.

Of the people who are readers, there are those who confine themselves to fiction, some whose specialty is history, others whose delight is in poetry, or in science, or in some other part of the spacious field of literature. But, in a special sense, there are readers who are "book-lovers," who find their greatest enjoyment in the books which breathe forth the very stuff of life, reveal the warm emotions of the writer, and give us that touch of nature which makes the whole world kin.
I can think of many such. One was Augustine Birrell, who only lately passed away in his eighty-fourth year. Another is A. Edward Newton, who wrote The Amenities of Book-Collecting, and Other Books, including one on Dr. Johnson, for Mr. Newton is an authority on the Great Cham of literature. His last book, a small volume entitled End-Papers is one of those written by a book-lover for book-lovers (Burrell 295).
FROM: "For Book-Lovers,"Crumbs Are Also Bread by Martin Burrell.

It is no doubt a pleasant thing to have a library left you. The present writer will disclaim no such legacy, but hereby undertakes to accept it, however dusty. But, good as it is to inherit a library, it is better to collect one. Each volume, then, however lightly a stranger's eye may roam from shelf to shelf, has its own individuality, a history of its own. You remember where you got it, and how much you gave for it ; and your word may safely be taken for the first of these facts, but not for the second (Birrell 289).
FROM: "Book-Buying," Obiter Dicta, Second Series by Augustine Birrell.

We collectors strive to make converts; we want others to enjoy what we enjoy; and I may as well confess that the envy shown by fellow collectors when we display our treasures is not annoying to us. But, speaking generally, we are a bearable lot, our hobbies are usually harmless, and if we loathe the subject of automobiles, and especially discussion relative to parts thereof, we try to show an intelligent interest in another's hobby, even if it happens to be the collection of postage-stamps. Our own hobby may be, probably is, ridiculous to some one else, but in all the wide range of human interest, from postage-stamps to paintings –– the sport of the millionaire, –– there is nothing that begins so easily and takes us so far as the collecting of books (Newton 2,3).
FROM: The Amenities of Book-Collecting and Kindred Affections by A. Edward Newton.

King James, 1605, when he came to our University at Oxford, and amongst other edifices, now went to view that famous Library, renewed by Sir Thomas Bodley, in imitation of Alexander, at his departure brake out into that noble speech: If I were not a King, I would be a University man; and if it were so that I must be a prisoner, if I might have my wish, I would desire to have no other prison than that Library, and to be chained together with so many good Authors and dead Masters (Burton 457).
FROM: "Pleasure of Study," The Anatomy of Melancholy by Robert Burton.

The research scholar who has lots of fun in his bookish hunting also wishes to share this fun. Although he does his happy hunting, his sleuthing alone, he wants to share his game. For he knows that there are people who may enjoy the results of his work, assuming, as one must, that we are all interested in life, and that books interpret life. And the bookish bypaths all reflect our never quite understandable human nature (Altrocchi xi).
FROM: Sleuthing in the Stacks by Rudolph Altrocchi

On a certain shelf in my bookcase which stands in the room in which I am at present sitting –– a bookcase surmounted by a white Dante, looking out with blind majestic eyes –– are collected a number of volumes which look somewhat the worse for wear. Those of them which originally possessed gilding have had it all fingered off, each of them has leaves turned down, and they open of themselves at places wherein I have been happy, and with whose every word I am familiar as with the furniture of the room in which I nightly slumber, each of them has remarks relevant and irrelevant scribbled on their margins. These favored volumes cannot be called peculiar glories of literature; but out of the world of books have I singled them, as I have singled my intimates out of the world of men. I am on easy terms with them, and feel that they are no higher than my heart . ... With the volumes on the special shelf I have spoken of, I am quite at home, and I feel somehow as if they were at home with me. And as to-day the trees bend to the blast, and the rain comes in dashes against my window, and as I have nothing to do, and cannot get out, and wish to kill the hours in a pleasant a manner as I can, I shall even talk about them, as in sheer liking a man talks about the trees in his garden, or the pictures on his wall. I can't expect to say anything new or striking, but I can give utterance to sincere affection, and that is always pleasant to one's self and generally not ungrateful to others (Smith 13-15).
FROM: A Shelf in My Bookcase by Alexander Smith.

The books that a man buys and keeps are more indicative of his character than the size of his bank account or the people with whom he associates. Books remain after a man's lifetime as mute reminders of the extent of his emotions and the degree of his intellect (Webber 2).
FROM: Books About Books: A Bio-Bibliography For Collectors by Winslow L. Webber

Even a millionaire will ease his toils, lengthen his life, and add a hundred per cent to his daily pleasures if he becomes a bibliophile ; while to the man of business with a taste of books, who through the day has struggled in the battle of life with all its irritating rebuffs and anxieties, what a blessed season of pleasurable repose opens upon him as he enters his sanctum, where every article wafts to him a welcome, and every book is a personal friend (Blades 141,142).
FROM: The Enemies of Books by William Blades.

And speaking of "friends on the shelves," where can one find friends more steadfast and loyal? These books of ours never dispute with us when we are weary, never tire us with small talk. There is complete harmony at all times. Among them are friends for every mood; we are never alone in the library. Scipio's remark that "a man is never less alone than when he is alone –– nunquam minus solus quam cum solus –– shows him to have been a book-lover. Books, wrote that prince of book-lovers, Richard de Bury, "are masters who instruct us without rod or ferrule; if you approach them they are not asleep; if you enquire of them they do not withdraw themselves; they never chide you when you make mistakes; they never laugh if you are ignorant" (Brewer 10,11).
FROM: Around the Library Table by Luther Albertus Brewer.

Let not the collector, therefore, ever, unless in some urgent and necessary circumstances, part with any of his treasures. Let him not even have recourse to that practice called barter, which political philosophers tell us is the universal resource of mankind preparatory to the invention of money as a circulating medium and means of exchange. Let him confine all his transactions in the market to purchasing only. No good ever comes of gentlemen amateurs buying and selling. They will either be systematic losers, or they will acquire shabby, questionable habits from which the professional dealers –– on whom, perhaps they look down –– are exempt (Burton 101).
FROM: The Book-Hunter by John Hill Burton

The mania for book collecting is by no means a modern disease, but has existed ever since there were books to gather, and has infected many of the wisest and most potent names in history. Euripides is ridiculed by Aristophanes in The Frog for collecting books. Of the Roman emperor Gordian, who flourished (or rather did not flourish, because he was slain after a reign of thirty-six days) in the third century, Gibbon says, "twenty-two acknowledged concubines and a library of sixty-two thousand volumes attested the variety of his inclinations, and from the productions which he left behind him it appears that the former, as well as the latter, were designed for use rather than ostentation (Browne 34).
FROM: "Bibliomania," Iconoclasm and Whitehwash by Irving Browne.

The venerableness of book collecting has, beyond doubt, argued against its acceptance by many. For generations the bibliophile has been pictured in the public mind as a dry-as-dust scholar or veritable Croesus. It has been the gradual breaking down of this fallacious conception –– the realization that it is not necessary to profess a love for old , musty tomes nor even be richly endowed –– that has opened up the pleasures of book collecting for thousands of book lovers. For every man of deep learning finding enjoyment in surrounding himself with volumes of a bygone age, hundreds of modern-minded collectors are finding equal pleasures in books as young as themselves. Similarly, for every man of wealth able to authorize unlimited bids to acquire the rare aves of the world's literature, a vastly larger number of collectors extract a full measure of enjoyment from books they can easily afford. And they know all the joys of true bibliophiles. They possess their 'rarities.' They derive as much pride from their collections as their far wealthier co-collectors whose prize book probably cost as much as all the volumes on their shelves. No, the complete joys of book collecting are not reserved for the few with still fat pocketbooks, and do not demand an appreciation of ancient works, interesting only to the historian and scholar. All the thrill and excitement of the chase are open to the man of meager purse, and one can qualify as a genuine bibliomaniac without ever stepping out of the twentieth century (Brewer 5,6).
FROM: The Delightful Diversion by Reginald Brewer.

There was a time when I lived to see my books arranged with a view to uniformity of height and harmony of color without respect to subjects. That time I regard as my vealy period. That was the time when we admired "Somnambula," and when the housewife used to have all the pictures hung on the same level, and to buy vases in pairs exactly alike, and putting them on either side of the parlor clock, which was generally surmounted by a prancing saracen or a weaving Penelope. Granting that a collection is not extensive enough to demand a strict arrangement by subjects, I like to see a little artistic confusion –– high and low together here and there, like a democratic community; now and then some giants laid down on their sides to rest; the shelves not uniformly filled out as if the owner never expected to buy any more, and alongside a dainty Angler a book in red or blue cloth with a white label –– just as children in velvet and furs sit next [to] a newsboy, or a little girl in calico with a pigtail at Sunday School, or as beggers and princes kneel side by side on the cathedral pavement. It is good to have these "swell" books rub against the commoners, which though not so elegant are frequently a great deal brighter (Browne 105).
FROM: "The Arrangement of Books," In the Track of the Book-Worm by Irving Browne.

If a man has any affection for books, he has his own way about them. Like Montaigne, he seeks the reading of books only to please himself by an honest diversion. Some buy books, some inherit them, and some have books thrust upon them. There are those who hunt for prizes with eager ambition, and others who are pursued by books, fairly driven into corners, eventually overwhelmed by them. He who hath a sufficiency, and may hide quietly among them without an itching greed to add to their number, deserves to be called happy; but I have never been fortunate enough to make the acquaintance of such a person. As for myself, I have come to that deplorable state when there are double rows upon the shelves and one never knows where to look for the neglected warriors who have been relegated ignominiously to the rear rank. If books have feelings, and I am sure they have, how melancholy must be the lives of those unfortunates wo are doomed to the perpetual obscurity of the back row (Joline 39,40).
FROM: The Diversions of a Book-lover by Adrian H. Joline.

There is a faculty which Horace Walpole named "serendipity." –– the luck of falling on just the literary document which one wants at the moment. All collectors of out of the way books know the pleasure of the exercise of serendipity, but they enjoy it in different ways. One man will go home hugging a volume of sermons, another a bulky collection of catalogues, which would have distended the pockets even of the wide great-coat made for that purpose, that Charles Nodier used to wear when he went a book-hunting. Others are captivated by black letter, others by the plays of such obscurities as Nabbes and Glapthorne. But however various the tastes of collectors of books, they are all agreed on one point, –– the love of printed paper. Even an Elzevir man can sympathize with Charles Lamb's attachment to "that folio Beaumont and Fletcher" which he dragged home at night from Barker's in Covent Garden. But it is another thing when Lamb says, "I do not care for a first folio of Shakespeare." A bibliophile who could say this could say anything (Lang 2,3).
FROM: "An Apology For the Book-hunter," The Library by Andrew Lang

Granger's History was the first book extended by the introduction of extra prints illustrative of its text; and Mr. Granger was the original Extra-illustrator, the father of the noble band of Grangerites. Unlike his descendants he wrote his book to illustrate his portraits; he did not collect his portraits to illustrate his book. He was followed at once by other collectors, who wanted a valid excuse for their collecting, and an asylum for their collections; and Clarendon's "History of the Rebellion and Civil War of England,"Walton's "Lives,""The History of the Worthies of England, Endeavored by Thomas Fuller, D.D.," John Aubrey's "Lives of Eminent Persons," and other contemporary historical and biographical works were extended and enlarged; many lesser illustrated books suffering, naturally, for the benefit of these (Hutton 36).
FROM: "On Grangerism and the Grangerites," From the Books of Laurence Hutton by Laurence Hutton.

ABC FOR BOOK-COLLECTORS¹

The author of this book must be either a fool or a knave. If he supposes that serious collectors are going to tolerate any man's laying down the law and airing his views, to the tune of 450 alphabetical entries, on book-collecting, bibliography, taste, technique, tactics, the auction room, printing, binding, paper-making, illustration, publishing history and a dozen other associated subjects, then he clearly knows very little about bibliomania, which breeds doctrinaires as opinionated and contentious as can be found in any walk of life.
If, on the other hand, he has conceived the base notion that beginners are humble enough to believe any claptrap about the bibliophile mystery that they read in print, just because an otherwise reputable publisher has been bamboozled into undertaking a book like this, then he is a cynical ruffian: far more a menace than the issue-mongers, mint-condition fetishists, point-maniacs and other strange fry whom he holds up to disapproval in the course of his 190-odd pages. ...
¹This notice of my book ABC for Book-Collectors was published in the Bookseller, 29 September 1953 (see Preface). It was signed; but the authorship of the work under review was not given (Carter 193).
FROM: "ABC FOR BOOK-COLLECTORS," Books and Book-Collectors by John Carter.

Books delight us, when prosperity smiles upon us; they comfort us inseparably when stormy fortune frowns on us. They lend validity to human compacts, and no serious judgments are propounded without their help. Art and sciences, all the advantages of which no mind can enumerate, consist in books. How highly must we estimate the wondrous power of books, since through them we survey the utmost bounds of the world and time, and contemplate the things that are as well as those that are not, as it were in the mirror of eternity. In books we climb mountains and scan the deepest gulfs of the abyss; in books we behold the finny tribes that may not exist outside their native waters, distinguish the properties of streams and springs and of various lands; from books we dig out gems and metals and the materials of every kind of mineral, and learn the herbs and trees and plants, and survey at will the whole progeny of Neptune, Ceres, and Plato (De Bury 94,95).
"Of the Advantages of the Love of Books," The Love of Books by Richard de Bury.

In treating the history of this disease, it will be found to have been attended with this remarkable circumstance; namely, that it has almost uniformly confined its attacks to the male sex, and, among those, to people in the higher and middling classes of society, while the artificer, labourer, and peasant have escaped wholly uninjured. It has raged chiefly in palaces, castles, halls, and gay mansions; and those things which in general are supposed not to be inimical to health, such as cleanliness, spaciousness, and splendour, are only so many inducements towards the introduction and propagation of the BIBLIOMANIA! What renders it particularly formidable is that it rages in all seasons of the year, and at all periods of human existence. The emotions of friendship are weakened or subdued as old age advances, but the influence of this passion, or rather disease, admits no mitigation: "it grows with our growth, and strengthens with our strength;" and is oft-times ––– The ruling passion strong in death (Dibdin 11,12).
FROM: Bibliomania; or Book-Madness by Thomas Frognall Dibdin.

There are as many kinds of people in the world as there are people in the world: (a) those who collect, and (b) those who don't.
Each kind is crazy. ...
Those who write them, and those who collect them. Those who don't write them, and those who don't collect them.
Any who inhale and exhale.
What is there for them to do? How shall they endure one moment after another moment until all the moments of their time on earth have elapsed and they must die?
What shall they do?
Well, they're doing it. It's nothing, almost technically it's history and art and all the other things. They're doing it, and it's nothing.
I figure the result is going to be colossal one of these centuries, and I don't mean Canadian quintuplets and Mussolini, flamboyance and fascism, lousy books and lousy collectors. I mean everything, expert and excellent (Saroyan). FROM: Those Who Write Them And Those Who Collect Them by William Saroyan

One hears of the golden age of book collecting, and the temptation is to mourn for that vanished age, until one discovers that each repetition of the phrase refers to another and different age. One reads of the triumphs of Heber and Huth, of Henry Stevens and Buxton Forman, of Andrew Lang and De Witt Miller, all notable collectors of their time, and one weeps for the passing of the day when book collecting was book collecting; when Omar Khayyam was to be had for a tuppence, and Swinburne's firsts were on every stall. One dreams of Tamerlane and The Second Funeral of Napoleon as in youth one dreamed of dimes and quarters beneath old sidewalks; and, waking, one curses the barren day that lie's beneath one's windows. But in time one realizes that the golden age of book collecting is here and now, and that it behooves one to take advantage of it (Starrett 33,34).
FROM: "The Diamond in the Dust Heap," Penny Wise And Book Foolish by Vincent Starrett.

In the tight little cosmos of the fisher of books just one form of collecting is wholly admirable and understandable; namely, the acquisition of rare books and manuscripts. The book collector has known many stamp and coin collectors, old furniture men, old glass and old pewter men who turned to books, but he has never known a first-grade bookman who got down off his hobby before the undertaker was sent for (Currie 19,20).
FROM: "How Collectors Happen," Fishers of Books by Barton Currie.

There are innumerable methods and systems of collecting books. One way is to restrict oneself to one particular field. This is often the best method, but a difficult one. Much pleasure can be derived from most any form of book collecting, whether the subject be on frogs, steam engines, sea shells, crime, drama, tobacco, typography, magic, philosophy, old medicine, erotica, aviation, music, or Elizabethan drama. To feel that you possess one of the finest and most complete collections of books on any one subject is naturally satisfying, and a source of pride. Aside from the monetary aspect, I doubt whether Folger (with his numerous Shakespeare folios) derived more pleasure from his hobby than does the young collector who is able to complete his collection of the first editions of William Faulkner or Edna St. Millay (Targ 8).
FROM: The Pauper's Guide to Book Collecting by William Targ.

Now where do books go? They go from the publisher to bookseller to customer to junk man to scout to dealer to dealer to dealer . . . to customer, and sometimes to one of the 2 percent of libraries where the librarian knows what he's doing.
The process takes times, sure; but rare-bookselling is almost the last remaining trade with the charm of leisure. It isn't a hurried man's calling, any more than it is a lazy man's (Everitt 118).
FROM: The Adventures of a Treasure Hunter by Charles P. Everitt.

Pleasure may be as good a justification for collecting as any other. The pleasure of pursuit, the pleasure of discovery, the pleasure of possession –– they all combine to gratify the mind and the senses. It would need a Stendhal to categorize and analyze the various degrees and phases of bibliophily. But just as his amour physique is only one, and the most elementary, kind of love, so the lust and satisfaction of possession is only one aspect of book-collecting (Hayward 24).
FROM: "Why First Editions?" Book Collecting: Four Broadcast Talks by R.W. Chapman, John Hayward, John Carter, and Michael Sadleir.

Few writers show such familiarity with poetry ancient and modern; and his books at Christ Church and the Bodleian testify to his fondness for literature of this class. There are those who hold that Francis Bacon not only wrote Shakespeare's plays and Spencer's Færie Queene, but also Burton's Anatomy of Melancholy. With the biliteral cipher, the whole story of Queen Elizabeth, Essex, and Bacon may be found in the pages of Democritus Junior! Is it not just as reasonable to suppose, as Mr. [George] Parker of Oxford suggested, that Burton himself wrote the plays of Shakespeare? Does he not quote him several times, and are there not fine original editions of Venus and Adonis and The Rape of the Lucrece among his books in the Bodleian? (Osler 523).
FROM: "Robert Burton: The Man, His Book, His Library," The Collected Essays of Sir William Osler, Volume III, The Historical and Biographical Essays.

I, too, have a fondness for poetry, and, in closing, I will share a poem with you.

With Pipe and Book
By Richard Le Gallienne

With Pipe and Book at close of day,
Oh, what is sweeter, mortal say?
It matters not what book on knee,
Old Izaak or the Odyssey,
It matters not meerschaum or clay.

And though one's eyes will dream astray,
And lips forget to sue or sway,
It is "enough to merely be,"
        With Pipe and Book.

What though our modern skies be gray,
As bards aver, I will not pray
For "soothing Death" to succor me,
But ask this much, O Fate, of thee,
A little longer yet to stay
        With Pipe and Book.