olish; but
so also is it to invoke, as some book-plates do, curses upon the heads
of all subsequent possessors--as if any man who wanted to add a volume
to his collection would be deterred by such braggadocio. But this is a
digression. Public libraries can never satisfy the longings of
book-collectors any more than can the private libraries of other
people. Whoever really cared a snap of his fingers for the contents of
another man's library, unless he is known to be dying? It is a
humorous spectacle to watch one book-collector exhibiting his stores
to another. If the owner is a gentleman, as he usually is, he affects
indifference--'A poor thing,' he seems to say, 'yet mine own'; whilst
the visitor, if human, as he always is, exhibits disgust. If the
volume proffered for the visitor's examination is a genuine rarity,
not in his own collection, he surlily inquires how it was come by;
whilst if it is no great thing, he testily expresses his astonishment
it should be thought worth keeping, and this although he has the very
same edition at home.

On the other hand, though actual visits to other men's libraries
rarely seem to give pleasure, the perusal of the catalogues of such
libraries has always been a favourite pastime of collectors; but this
can be accounted for without in any way aspersing the truth of the
general statement that the only books a lover of them takes pleasure
in are his own.

Mr. Gosse's recent volume, _Gossip in a Library_, is a very pleasing
example of the pleasure taken by a book-hunter in his own books. Just
as some men and more women assume your interest in the contents of
their nurseries, so Mr. Gosse seeks to win our ears as he talks to us
about some of the books on his shelves. He has secured my willing
attention, and is not likely to be disappointed of a considerable
audience.

We live in vocal times, when small birds make melody on every bough.
The old book-collectors were a taciturn race--the Bindleys, the
Sykeses, the Hebers. They made their vast collections in silence;
their own tastes, fancies, predilections, they concealed. They never
gossiped of their libraries; their names are only preserved to us by
the prices given for their books after their deaths. Bindley's copy
fetched L3 10s., Sykes' L4 15s. Thus is the buyer of to-day tempted to
his doom, forgetful of the fact that these great names are only quoted
when the prices realized at their sales were less than those now
demanded.