rt by one enlightened
scholar who happened to be in a profitable business of another who
happened to be out of it. The earlier life of Erasmus exhibits a rather
depressing illustration of the humiliations to which professional
scholars were exposed in trying to get a living from the pensions and
benefactions of the idle rich. Literary patronage, as it existed from
the days of Horace and Maecenas down to the death-blow which Dr. Johnson
gave it in his famous letter to Lord Chesterfield, has never helped the
independence or the self-respect of scholars and poets. It was Froben's
peculiar good fortune to be able to employ, on a business basis with a
regular salary, the greatest scholar of the age as one of his editors
and literary advisers, and at the same time enable him to preserve his
independence of thought and of action. Aldus and the French publishers
had gathered about them professional scholars and experts for the
execution of specific tasks at the market price, supplemented often by
generous private hospitality. That was good; but far better was Froben's
relation with his friend, his intellectual master, and his profitable
client Erasmus. In an age when no copyright laws existed for the
author's benefit the works of Erasmus were shamelessly pirated in
editions, published in Germany and France, from which the author
received not a penny. Yet Froben went right on paying to Erasmus not
only the fixed annual salary as a member of his consulting staff but
also a generous share of the profits upon his books. In a greedy,
unscrupulous, and rapacious age this wise and just, not to say generous,
policy stands out as prophetic of a better time.

As a printer Froben was distinguished by the singular beauty of his
roman type, the perfection of his presswork, and the artistic decoration
of his books. In this last respect he was much indebted to the genius of
Hans Holbein, whom he discovered as a young wood-engraver seeking work
as Basel. With that keen eye for unrecognized genius which marked his
career he employed Holbein to design borders and initials for his books.
Later, with an equally sagacious and generous spirit, perceiving that
the young artist was too great a man to spend his days in a printing
office, he procured for him through Sir Thomas More an introduction to
the court of Henry VIII, where he won fame and fortune as a portrait
painter. I narrate the incident because it illustrates a very attractive
and amiable a