ogue of his library in four volumes, which was disposed
of at the sale of his collection for seven pounds, fifteen shillings. It
is said that he always wrote on the first fly-leaf of his books
'Perfect'--or otherwise, as the case might be.

After his death his library was sold by auction by Mr. Christie of Pall
Mall. The sale, which commenced on the 27th of March 1776 and lasted
till April 6th, consisted of one thousand six hundred and seventy-five
lots. It does not appear to have been well managed, for Nichols says,
'there were many hundred most rare Black-letter books and Tracts,
unbound, with curious cuts. They were sold I remember in large bundles,
and were piled under the tables in the Auction Room, on which the other
books were exposed to view, and were not seen by the Booksellers who
were the purchasers.' A priced copy of the catalogue is preserved in the
British Museum, which shows that the Caxtons fetched but two hundred and
thirty-six pounds, five shillings and sixpence; the highest prices
obtained being sixteen pounds for the _Game of the Chesse_, fifteen
guineas for the _Dictes or Sayings of the Philosophers_, and nine
pounds, fifteen shillings for the _Golden Legende_. King George III.
bought twenty of the Caxtons at an aggregate cost of about eighty-five
pounds. Among them were the _De Consolatione Philosophiae_ of Boethius,
_Reynard the Foxe_, the _Golden Legende_, the _Curial_, and the
_Speculum Vitae Christi_. The Boethius, which was a fine copy, was
acquired for four pounds, six shillings. A copy of the _Bokys of Hawkyng
and Huntyng, etc._, ascribed to Dame Juliana Bernes, printed at St.
Albans in 1486, sold for nine pounds, twelve shillings, and a manuscript
Bible on vellum, finely illuminated, for two pounds, ten shillings.

JAMES WEST, 1704?-1772

James West, who is described by Dibdin as 'a Non-Pareil Collector: the
first who, after the days of Richard Smith, succeeded in reviving the
love of black-letter lore and of Caxtonian typography,' was born about
1704. He was the son of Richard West of Priors Marston in Warwickshire,
said to be descended from Leonard, a younger son of Thomas West, Lord de
la Warr, who died in 1525. James West was educated at Balliol College,
Oxford, whence he took the degrees of B.A. in 1723 and M.A. in 1726. In
1721 he was admitted as a student at the Inner Temple, and was called to
the Bar in 1728. On the 4th of January 1737, while residing in the
Temple, he los