ste when we
turn over the pages of one of William Pickering's catalogues--that for
1827--and observe a perfect set of the four folio Shakespeares,
1623-85, marked L105, while a large-paper series of Hearne's books, or
of some standard edition of the classics in morocco, cost more;
whereas at present the Hearnes and the classics are barely saleable at
any price, and the dramatic volumes might be worth twenty times more
than they brought seventy years since.

The poetical writers of the Tudor, Elizabethan, and Stuart eras have
had, in a commercial sense, two or three reverses of fortune. From the
period of publication down to the last quarter of the eighteenth
century they were to be bought at prices little beyond waste paper, so
soon as the original interest in them had subsided. The editors of
Shakespeare--Pope, Hanmer, Theobald, Warburton, Capell, Steevens,
Malone, Farmer, and Reed--awakened a sort of new interest in the
subject, just in time to save the slender salvage of a century and a
half's neglect or indifference from the mill and the kitchen-fire; and
their example led to others coming upon the ground, such as West,
Major Pearson, the Duke of Roxburghe, Lord Blandford, Lord Spencer,
Bindley, and Heber, whose motives were primarily acquisitive. In or
about 1833 a strong reaction set in, and prices fell till 1842-45,
when the Bright and Chalmers sales, and the more sensible competition
of the British Museum, again restored confidence and strength to the
market. Since that time, our old poets have not, on the whole,
suffered any marked decline, and the most recent revival is in their
favour.

The Americans, it seems, call for first editions, and they have not to
call twice, though they may be required to pay smartly. This new
ticket owes its origin to the usual agency. One or two Transatlantic
book-lovers gain the information from some source that this is the
real article, that if you want fine poetry you must go to these
fellows--not exactly Shakespeare and Spenser, for they had heard of
them before--but to Gascoigne, Sydney, Herrick, Carew, Suckling,
Lovelace, and the rest of the company; and above all, if you desire to
enjoy their beauties and appreciate their genius fully and absolutely,
you are referred to the _editio princeps_--not that which the author
corrected and preferred, but the one in morocco extra, which your
bookseller recommends to you.

It is by no means that we seek to ridicule or discourage