r of the
stamp of Mr. Hartley was almost sufficient to support such an
establishment as Newman's in Holborn or Toovey's in Piccadilly. You
might pass the latter, or both, day after day and week after week, and
not see a soul enter or leave the premises; all was done by
correspondence and flukes and a few real good buyers in the
background. Mr. Quaritch in London or M. Fontaine in Paris will clear
more in an afternoon by the change of hands of two or three heavy
items than a small dealer, even if he is unusually lucky, will do in a
twelvemonth out of thousands of petty and troublesome transactions. It
is not particularly unusual for a big firm to sell at one sitting four
or five thousand pounds worth of property. There are others which have
not sold as much during the entire term of their career, and never
will.

The works which enjoy their turn of public favour are generally
recognisable in the catalogues by the type in which they are set
forth; and any one who has stood by and witnessed all the changes of
the last thirty or forty years observes periodical phenomena in the
transfer of typographical honours from one school of authors, or one
group of subjects, to another. The most recent auctioneers' catalogues
reflect the sentiment of the day in lavishing capitals on trifles from
the pens of more or less ephemeral modern writers, and registering
with corresponding brevity much of the old English literature, which
a few years since was in the ascendant. A rare volume of Elizabethan
verse or prose halts after an insignificant brochure by Lamb, Dickens,
or Thackeray, which the respective authors would have judged scarcely
worth preserving, to which their indifference, in point of fact,
constitutes the cause of scarcity and consequent appreciation.

So it was once upon a time, to be sure, with the Caxton, the quarto
Shakespeare, the ballad, the penny black-letter garland, and many
another article which we now hold so precious. The man who could
secure Caxtons and Shakespeares for pence, was he happier? Why, no;
for he simply followed the market and nobody was envious. He lifted
his acquisition off the counter or stall for the best of all
reasons--because he fancied it--nay, because he intended to read it
when he reached home.

A plea from the absolute collector's point of view--I fear, a weak and
false one--is occasionally advanced for books which were formerly in
fashion and favour; for example, Sylvester's _Du Bartas_