Prices of Books Part 3

Then in his hand another piece he takes, And in its praise a long harangue he makes; And tells them that ?tis writ in lofty verse, One that is out of print and very scarce: Then with high language, and a stately look, He sets a lofty price upon the book; ?Five pound, four pound, three pound,? he cries aloud, And holds it up to expose it to the crowd, With arm erect,--the bidders to provoke To raise the price before the impending stroke; This in the throng does emulation breed, And makes ?em strive each other to outbid; While he descants upon their learned heats, And his facetious dialect repeats: For none like him, for certain, knew so well (By way of auction) any goods to sell.

?Tis endless to express the wayes he had To sell their good, and to put off their bad.

But ah! in vain I strive his fame to spread; The great, the wise, the knowing man is dead.

And you in painting skill?d, his loss bewail; He?s dead!--that did expose your works to sale.

Can you forget how he for you did bawl, ?Come, put it in?--a fine original, Done by a curious hand:--What strokes are here, Drawn to the life? How fine it does appear!

O lovely piece!--Ten pound,--five pound;--for shame, You do not bid the value of the frame.?

How many pretty stories would he tell To enhance the price, and make the picture sell!

But now he?s gone!--ah! the sad loss deplore; Great Millington!--alas! he is no more.

And you, the Muses? darlings, too, rehea.r.s.e Your sorrows for the loss of him in verse: Mourn! mourn! together, for that tyrant death Has robb?d the famous auctioneer of breath.?

THE EPITAPH.

Underneath this marble stone Lies the famous Millington; A man who through the world did steer I? th? station of an auctioneer; A man with wondrous sense and wisdom blest, Whose qualities are not to be exprest.

We have given so much s.p.a.ce to Millington, because it is interesting to see how similar were the practices of auctioneers at the first inst.i.tution of the business to what they are at the present time, and also because Millington seems to have been considered the most famous of auctioneers, until James Christie arose to take his place as chief representative of the profession. It may be added to his honour that he was a friend of Milton, who lodged in his house.

Richard Chiswell (1639-1711) was more of a bookseller than an auctioneer, but his name must be mentioned here. He was one of the four who issued the fourth folio edition of Shakespeare?s Plays, and he was the official publisher of the Votes of the House. Dunton describes him as ?the metropolitan bookseller of England, if not of all the world,?

and says that he never printed a bad book, or one on bad paper.

Jonathan Greenwood, bookseller and auctioneer, is described by Dunton as a worthy but unfortunate man, ?so that the chief thing he has left to boast of is a virtuous wife and several small children.? He adds, ?But he still deserves the love and esteem of all good men, for the worst that can be said of him is, ?There goes a poor honest man,? which is much better than ?There goes a rich knave.??

How little is known of some of these early auctioneers may be seen from the fact that John Bullord, who sold books at the end of the seventeenth century, is said by the careful John Nichols to be a member of the well-known bookselling family of Ballard. I cannot find any information respecting Bullord, but it is very improbable that this name was merely a misspelling of Ballard.

The name of Samuel Paterson (1728-1802) will always be held in honour among English bibliographers, for he was one of the first to improve the art of cataloguing, and he gained great fame from his labours in this department. He had one great fault, however, for he was so insatiable a reader, that when in cataloguing he came upon a book he had not seen before, he must needs read the book then, and thus his work was much delayed, and often his catalogues could not be obtained until a few hours before the sale. He was the son of a woollen draper in St. Paul?s, Covent Garden, but lost his father when he was only twelve years old; his guardian neglected him, and having involved his property in his own bankruptcy, sent him to France. Here he acquired a considerable knowledge of French literature, which served him in good stead through life. When little more than twenty years of age he opened a shop in the Strand, opposite Durham Yard. This bookselling business was unsuccessful, and he then commenced as a general auctioneer at Ess.e.x House. It was during this period of his life that he saved the collection of valuable ma.n.u.scripts formerly belonging to Sir Julius C?sar from being sold as waste-paper to a cheesemonger. He cla.s.sified the MSS., and made an excellent catalogue of them, and when they came to be sold by auction they realised ?356. Although Paterson made an excellent auctioneer, he was no more successful financially than in his other ventures. He therefore accepted the post of librarian to the Earl of Shelburne (afterwards first Marquis of Lansdowne); but after a few years there was a quarrel, and he was obliged to return to the business of cataloguing and selling of libraries.

The Rev. C. H. Hartshorne, in his ?Book Rarities,? mentions a print by Nicholls in the British Museum, called ?The Complete Auctioneer,?

representing a man with spectacles on, standing at a table covered with books, which are lettered at the tops. Underneath are these lines--

?Come, sirs, and view this famous Library; ?Tis pity learning should discouraged be: Here?s bookes (that is, if they were but well sold) I will maintain ?t are worth their weight in gold.

Then bid apace, and break me out of hand: Ne?er cry you don?t the subject understand.

For this I?ll say--howe?er the case may hit,-- Whoever buys of me--I?ll teach ?em wit.?

Although the London booksellers went into the country to sell books, there were some local auctioneers, as, for instance, Michael Johnson (the father of Dr. Samuel Johnson), who kept a bookstall in Lichfield, and attended the neighbouring towns on market days. Johnson?s address to his customers is taken from ?A Catalogue of Choice Books, ... to be sold by auction, or he who bids most, at the Talbot, in Sidbury, Worcester,?

and is quoted from Clarke?s _Repertorium Bibliographic.u.m_ (1819)--

?TO ALL GENTLEMEN, LADIES, AND OTHERS IN OR NEAR WORCESTER,--I have had several auctions in your neighbourhood, as Gloucester, Tewkesbury, Evesham, &c., with success, and am now to address myself and try my fortune with you.--You must not wonder that I begin every Day?s Sale with small and common books; the reason is a room is some time a filling, and persons of address and business, seldom coming first, they are entertainment till we are full; they are never the last books of the best kind of that sort for ordinary families and young persons, &c. But in the body of the Catalogue you will find Law, Mathematicks, History: and for the learned in Divinity there are Drs. Souter, Taylor, Tillotson, Beveridge, and Flavel, &c., the best of that kind: and to please the Ladies I have added store of fine pictures and paper hangings, and, by the way, I would desire them to take notice that the pictures shall always be put up by the noon of that day they are to be sold, that they may be view?d by day light. I have no more but to wish you pleas?d and myself a good sale, who am

Your Humble Servant,

M. JOHNSON.?

The sale took place in the evening, commencing at six o?clock and continuing till all the lots were sold.

The existing firms of literary auctioneers, Sotheby, Wilkinson & Hodge; Puttick & Simpson; Christie, Manson & Woods; and Hodgsons, are all of considerable standing, but Sotheby?s is of the greatest antiquity.

Samuel Baker, the founder of the house, commenced business in 1744 with sale of Dr. Thomas Pellet?s library (?859) in York Street, Covent Garden. He continued sole member of the firm till 1774, when he entered into partners.h.i.+p with George Leigh (who is styled by Beloe ?the finical bookseller?). Baker died in 1778, in his sixty-sixth year, when he left his property to his nephew, John Sotheby, who in 1780 was in partners.h.i.+p with Leigh. In 1800 the style was Leigh, Sotheby & Son, John Sotheby?s son Samuel being taken into partners.h.i.+p. In 1803 the business was removed from York Street to 145 Strand, opposite Catharine Street, and in 1818 to the present house in Wellington Street. The third and last Sotheby, Mr. Samuel Leigh Sotheby, became a partner in 1837, and in 1843 Mr. John Wilkinson entered the firm as a partner. The style was Sotheby and Wilkinson till 1864, when Mr. Edward Grose Hodge became a partner, and from that date the name of the firm has been Sotheby, Wilkinson, and Hodge.

The firm of Puttick & Simpson dates back to the establishment of the business by Mr. Stewart in 1794 at 191 Piccadilly. The business was bought by Wheatley & Adlard on the retirement of Mr. Stewart. For a short time it was carried on by Mr. Fletcher, who was succeeded in 1846 by Messrs. Puttick & Simpson. In 1858 the business was removed from Piccadilly to 47 Leicester Square. Mr. Puttick died in 1873.

The firm of Christie?s was established soon after that of Sotheby?s, and James Christie the elder?s (1730-1803) first sale was on the 5th December 1766, at rooms in Pall Mall, formerly occupied by the print warehouse of Richard Dalton. Christie afterwards removed next door to Gainsborough, at Schomberg House, and died there, 8th November 1803. His son, James Christie the younger (1773-1831), was born in Pall Mall, and was educated at Eton. In 1824 he removed to the present premises in King Street, formerly Wilson?s European Emporium. Mr. Christie died in King Street, 2nd February 1831, aged fifty-eight. Mr. George Christie succeeded his father. Mr. William Manson died in 1852, and was succeeded by his brother, Mr. Edward Manson. In 1859 Mr. James Christie, the great-grandson of the founder, and Mr. Thomas Woods, joined the firm.

FOOTNOTES:

[10] _Bibliomania_, Part V.

[11] An annotated translation of _Auctio Davisiana_ was published in ?Book-Lore,? vol. iii. p. 166; vol. iv. p. 1. The translator possesses a copy formerly belonging to Bishop Wordsworth of Lincoln, in which is written, in a contemporary hand, _ex dono Bibliopol? Ric Davis_.

[12] _Reliqui? Hearnian?_, 1869, vol. ii. p. 172.

CHAPTER III

PRICES OF Ma.n.u.sCRIPT BOOKS

In a treatise devoted to an inquiry concerning the varying prices of books, it is necessary that at least one chapter should be devoted to ma.n.u.scripts. There is no field of investigation which offers a more interesting subject for study, and few that are more difficult to master. Ma.n.u.scripts are really more attractive than printed books, because they are so various, and have been produced over a much longer period of the world?s history. It is therefore strange that so few authors care to trouble themselves about them; that this is so may be seen from the large number of readers at the British Museum who are contented to quote over and over again from the much-used printed books, and the comparatively few who cultivate the virgin soil of the Ma.n.u.script Department, where there are endless stores of unused materials.

Ma.n.u.scripts are usually somewhat miscellaneous in character, for they consist (1) of some of the finest examples of the pictorial art of many ages; (2) of the originals of the great works of antiquity; (3) of a large number of valuable works that have never been printed; (4) of charters, doc.u.ments, letters, memoranda, &c., which are of great value, but which are not books, and therefore do not come within the scope of our present inquiry. In respect to the prices of the ma.n.u.scripts, it is very difficult to say anything of much value, because (1) many of the most important ma.n.u.scripts have been transferred from library to library in bulk, and it is comparatively seldom that they come up for public sale; (2) the buyers of ma.n.u.scripts are fewer than those of printed books, and therefore it is more difficult to arrive at a real standard price for books which are practically unique, as there is no wide public opinion upon the subject. But for the present purpose, a still more important reason why this vast subject cannot be dealt with in a succinct manner is, that the materials for its history have not yet been thoroughly investigated by experts. The relative prices at different periods are hard to understand, even in England, where money has been better regulated than in most countries; but when we have to deal with foreign countries and foreign coins, we are necessarily at a loss how to convert into their present value coins which may have been depreciated at the time we are dealing with, and have certainly been still more depreciated since: for instance, what idea is communicated to the mind of the modern reader when he is told that ?Borso d?Este paid forty ducats for a _Josephus_ and a _Quintus Curtius_, while his large two-volume Bible cost him 1375 sequins??[13]

In dealing with ma.n.u.scripts, it is most important to distinguish between plain and illuminated ma.n.u.scripts. The neglect of this caution has led to an exaggerated idea of the cost of books before the invention of printing. Instances have been given of purchases at sums equal to a king?s ransom. Hence it is supposed that books were so dear that they were quite out of the reach of any but the richest personages. But this view is erroneous, for we know that by means of the slave labour at Rome and the organised work in the monasteries, plainly written ma.n.u.scripts could be obtained at a reasonable price. We know now that transcripts of MSS. can be had at a price which, if dear when compared with the price of a newly-published printed book, is by no means extravagant. What could be done at a centre of civilisation like Rome, where books were produced in large numbers and at low prices on account of the organisation of literary production, could be done at other places.

There is evidence that at London, and at those seats of learning, Oxford and Cambridge, where caligraphy was a profession, books were not difficult to obtain. Every church and chapel must have had service-books. Probably during the Middle Ages, when travelling was arduous and expensive, persons living in out-of-the-way places had to pay special prices for their literary treasures.

The late Professor J. Henry Middleton referred to this matter of cost in his valuable work on ?Illuminated Ma.n.u.scripts? (1892). After quoting from Aulus Gellius, he wrote--

?But ordinary copies of newly-published works, even by popular authors, appear to have been but little more expensive than books of this cla.s.s are at the present day. The publisher and bookseller Tryphon could sell Martial?s first book of _Epigrams_ at a profit for two denarii--barely two s.h.i.+llings in modern value (see Mart.

xiii. 3). It may seem strange that written ma.n.u.scripts should not have been much more costly than printed books, but when one considers how they were produced, the reason is evident. Atticus, the Sosii, and other chief publishers of Rome, owned a large number of slaves, who were trained to be neat and rapid scribes. Fifty or a hundred of these slaves could write from the dictation of one reader, and thus a small edition of a new volume of Horace?s _Odes_ or Martial?s _Epigrams_ could be produced with great rapidity, and at very small cost? (p. 19).

In the fifteenth century, even, ill.u.s.trated Books of Hours were produced in France, Flanders, and Holland at a cheap rate. Mr. Middleton wrote--

?Education had gradually been extended among various cla.s.ses of laymen, and by the middle of the fifteenth century it appears to have been usual not only for all men above the rank of artizans to be able to read, but even women of the wealthy bourgeois cla.s.s could make use of prayer-books. Hence arose a great demand for pictured _Books of Hours_, which appear to have been produced in enormous quant.i.ties by the trade scribes of towns, such as Bruges, Paris, and many others. These common ma.n.u.script Hours are monotonous in form and detail; they nearly always have the same set of miniatures, which are coa.r.s.e in detail and harsh in colour? (p. 141).

Mr. Middleton gives some further information respecting the cost of production of certain service-books taken from some church records in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries--

?From these accounts (1379-1385) we learn that six ma.n.u.scripts were written, illuminated, and bound, one of them with gold or silver clasps or bosses, at a total cost of ?14, 9s. 3d., more than ?150 in modern value? (p. 222). ?Three Processionals only cost ?1, 17s. 4d., being on forty-six quaternions of cheap parchment made of sheepskin, which cost only 2-1/2d. the quaternion? (p. 223).

There was thus great variety of cost in the production of the various kinds of books, but when we consider the matter, we shall find it impossible to do other than believe that a demand for service-books, the price of which was not prohibitive, must have existed.

The Rev. T. Hartwell Horne gave in his ?Introduction to Bibliography?

some instances of the prices of ma.n.u.scripts in the Middle Ages, but as some of these were evidently exceptional cases, although they have been used by historians to draw conclusions which we must consider as erroneous, they need not be repeated here.

Dr. S. R. Maitland in his admirable work on the ?Dark Ages? comments with much acuteness on some of these cases as quoted by Dr. Robertson, and shows that the historian has drawn a general conclusion from special instances, which in certain cases have not been correctly reported.

Maitland adds that some writer a few centuries hence might--

?Tell his gaping readers ... that in the year 1812 one of our n.o.bility gave ?2260 and another ?1060 for a single volume, and that the next year a Johnson?s Dictionary was sold by public auction to a plebeian purchaser for ?200. A few such facts would quite set up some future Robertson, whose readers would never dream that we could get better reading, and plenty of it, much cheaper at that very time. The simple fact is, that there has always been such a thing as bibliomania since there have been books in the world, and no member of the Roxburghe Club has yet equalled the Elector of Bavaria, who gave a town for a single ma.n.u.script? (pp. 66-7).

Interesting particulars respecting the composition, binding, and expenses of Petrarch?s library will be found in M. de Nolhac?s monograph on the subject. Petrarch kept copyists in his house, whose shortcomings occasioned him much vexation. He bequeathed his library to Venice, and the Venetians are accused of having suffered it to be dispersed, but it would seem that it never reached them.