atter the Kemble dramatic library formed the
_nucleus_, Payne Collier filling up at the Heber and other sales many
important _lacunae_. The late Duke ill-advisedly engaged a foreign
gentleman to compile his catalogue, and the result is most
unfortunate. Besides the Henry Cavendish and Hobbes elements, a few
very valuable items came from the old library at Bolton Abbey,
Yorkshire.

The Althorp heirlooms, now removed to Manchester, have been
familiarised by the catalogues of them printed by Dibdin; but there
are hundreds of precious volumes which he has overlooked, and of which
some account is given in the present writer's _Collections_ from the
books themselves. An idea of the Dysart and Britwell libraries is to
be gathered from Blades's _Caxton_, Dibdin's _Ames_, and Hazlitt's
_Collections_. Of the possessions in this way of the Marquises of Bath
and Bute we gain only casual glimpses from the same sources. Payne
Collier and Hazlitt have made the Bridgewater House library fairly
well known. The Huth one is elsewhere referred to, and of Lord Acton's
a sale catalogue of a portion was prepared some years since, as well
as a bibliographical account; but the former was suppressed, and the
latter remains incomplete and in MS.

Of Lord Aldenham's collection (Early English Literature, Bibles,
Classics, MSS., &c.) there is a privately printed catalogue, 1888, and
there is also one of the late Mr. Locker-Lampson's literary
treasures.

CHAPTER IV

Classification of collections--Origin of the taste for
books--Schedule of topics or branches of inquiry--Each separately
considered and the authorities cited--Ancient typography--British
history and topography--Liturgies--Books of Hours--The _Imitatio
Christi_--_Pilgrim's Progress_--Books of Emblems--Books of
Characters--Books printed before the Great Fire, at Oxford,
during the Civil War and Interregnum, &c.--Monastic and patristic
writers--English devotional and other books printed
abroad--Froschover's Zuerich Bible of 1550--Other Bibles--The
French Bible of 1523-28--Minor specialisms.

AS books, in a manuscript or printed shape, are far more numerous and
varied than any other species of property, and are also more largely
sought for purposes of direct study and instruction, there exists the
greater difficulty in attempting to advise collectors as to the line
which it is best, wisest, or safest to embrace.

The class of