covered strength sufficient to
proceed with the main story.

LYSAND. Madam, I am equally indebted to your brother for his care of
the body, and to my friend for his recreation of the mind. The
midnight hour, I fear, is swiftly approaching.

LOREN. It is yet at a considerable distance. We have nearly reached
the middle of the eighteenth century, and you may surely carry on your
reminiscential exertions to the close of the same. By that time, we
may be disposed for our nightcaps.

LYSAND. Unheeded be the moments and hours which are devoted to the
celebration of eminent BOOK-COLLECTORS! Let the sand roll down the
glass as it will; let "the chirping on each thorn" remind us of
Aurora's saucy face peering above the horizon! in such society, and
with such a subject of discussion, who--

LIS. Lysander brightens as his story draws to a close: his colouring
will be more vivid than ever.

BELIND. Tell me--are bibliographers usually thus eloquent? They have
been described to me as a dry, technical race of mortals--quoting only
title-pages and dates.

LYSAND. Madam, believe not the malicious evidence of book-heretics.
Let ladies, like yourself and your sister, only make their appearance
with a choice set of bibliomaniacs, at this time of night, and if the
most interesting conversation be not the result--I have very much
under-rated the colloquial powers of my brethren. But you shall hear.

We left off with lauding the bibliomaniacal celebrity of Harley, Earl
of Oxford. Before the dispersion of his grand collection, died JOHN
BRIDGES,[378] a gentleman, a scholar, and a notorious book-collector.
The catalogue of his books is almost the first classically arranged
one in the eighteenth century: and it must be confessed that the
collection was both curious and valuable. Bridges was succeeded by
ANTHONY COLLINS,[379] the Free Thinker; a character equally strange
and unenviable. Book-fanciers now and then bid a few shillings, for a
copy of the catalogue of his library; and some sly free-thinkers, of
modern date, are not backward in shewing a sympathy in their
predecessor's fame, by the readiness with which they bid a
half-guinea, or more, for a _priced copy_ of it.

[Footnote 378: _Bibliothecae Bridgesianae Catalogus_: or a
Catalogue of the Library of JOHN BRIDGES, Esq., consisting
of above 4000 books and manuscripts in all Languages and
Faculties; particularly in Classics and History; and
especially th