r by their
link with some great personality. These stand out in relief from the
normal category of foreign literature; they speak a language which
should be intelligible to all.

It must be obvious that in a restricted space a writer has no scope
for anecdote and gossip, if they are not actually out of place in a
technical undertaking. Yet we have endeavoured to lay before our
readers, in as legible a form as possible, a view of the subject and
counsel as to the various methods and lines of Collecting.

Such an enterprise as we offer, in the face of several which have
already appeared under various titles and auspices, may at first sight
seem redundant; but perhaps it is not really the case. A book of this
class is, as a rule, written by a scholar for scholars; that is all
very well, and very charming the result is capable of proving. Or,
again, the book is addressed by a bibliographer to bibliographers; and
here there may be, with a vast deal that is highly instructive, a
tendency to bare _technique_, which does not commend itself to many
outside the professional or special lines. It was thought, under these
circumstances, that a new volume, combining readability and a fair
proportion of general interest with practical information and advice,
was entitled to favourable consideration; and the peculiar training of
the present writer during his whole life, at once as a _litterateur_
and a practical bookman, encouraged the idea on his part that it might
well be feasible for him to carry the plan into execution, and produce
a view of a permanently interesting and important subject in all its
branches and aspects, appealing not only to actual book-collectors,
but to those who may naturally desire to learn to what the science and
pursuit amount.

One of the best apologies for book-collecting, and even for the
accumulation of fine books, is that offered by McCulloch in the
preface to his own catalogue. The writer takes occasion to observe,
among other points and arguments: "It is no doubt very easy to
ridicule the taste for fine books and their accumulation in extensive
libraries. But it is not more easy than to ridicule the taste for
whatever is most desirable, as superior clothes, houses, furniture,
and accommodation of every sort. A taste for improved or fine books is
one of the least equivocal marks of the progress of civilisation, and
it is as much to be preferred to a taste for those that are coarse and
ill got up, a