e number of copies is limited to five hundred._

_Another consideration deeply impressed itself upon the mind of the
Author. The course of thirty years has necessarily brought changes and
alterations amongst "men and things." The dart of death has been so
busy during this period that, of the Bibliomaniacs so plentifully
recorded in the previous work, scarcely_ three,_--including the
Author--have survived. This has furnished a monitory theme for the
APPENDIX; which, to the friends both of the dead and the living,
cannot be perused without sympathising emotions--_

_"A sigh the absent claim, the DEAD a tear."_

_The changes and alterations in "things,"--that is to say in the_
=Bibliomania= _itself--have been equally capricious and unaccountable:
our countrymen being, in_ these _days, to the full as fond of novelty
and variety as in those of Henry the Eighth. Dr. Board, who wrote his_
Introduction of Knowledge _in the year 1542, and dedicated it to the
Princess Mary, thus observes of our countrymen:_

_I am an Englishman, and naked do I stand here,
Musing in my mind what raiment I shall wear;
For now I will wear_ this, _and now I will wear_ that,
_Now I will wear--I cannot tell what._

_This highly curious and illustrative work was reprinted, with all its
wood-cut embellishments, by Mr. Upcott. A copy of the original and
most scarce edition is among the Selden books in the Bodleian library,
and in the Chetham Collection at Manchester. See the_ Typographical
Antiquities, _vol._ iii. _p._ 158-60.

_But I apprehend the general apathy of Bibliomaniacs to be in a great
measure attributable to the vast influx of BOOKS, of every
description, from the Continent--owing to the long continuance of
peace; and yet, in the appearance of what are called_ English
Rarities, _the market seems to be almost as barren as ever. The
wounds, inflicted in the HEBERIAN contest, have gradually healed, and
are subsiding into forgetfulness; excepting where, from_ collateral
_causes, there are too many_ striking _reasons to remember their
existence._

_Another motive may be humbly, yet confidently, assigned for the
re-appearance of this Work. It was thought, by its late
proprietor,--MR. EDWARD WALMSLEY[1]--to whose cost and liberality this
edition owes its appearance--to be a volume, in itself, of pleasant
and profitable perusal; composed perhaps in a quaint and original
style, but in accordance with the characters of