Rev. Ebenezer Pemberton. Philadelphia
held book auction sales many years in advance of New York, the
earliest known being that of the library of Charles Read, in 1737. The
date of the first sale in New York is unknown, as is the name of the
auctioneer, but an advertisement of McLaughlin & Blakely, of 41 Maiden
Lane, in a paper of May 4, 1825, reads as follows, "From the long
acquaintance of Mr. McLaughlin with the book auction business, he
trusts that the firm will receive a consequent share of public
patronage." It is known that McLaughlin & Co. held unimportant book
sales at 78 Maiden Lane in 1824, and late though this date is, it will
have to stand as representing the earliest book auction sale in New
York until newly discovered evidence reveals an earlier recorded
one.[5]

[Footnote 5: "Seventy Years of Book Auctions in New
York," Robert F. Roden.]

It rarely happens that a really great collection of books is sold
otherwise than at auction. The collector recognizes that the taste and
judgment displayed by him in the acquirement of his library will, by
the medium of the auctioneer's carefully prepared catalogue, be made
evident to all succeeding generations of book lovers. How many would
to-day know the names of George Brinley, John Allan, and William
Menzies, were it not for the sale catalogues of their collections?
They attained book-fame without having sought it.

In this connection, an extract may be quoted from the will of Edmond
de Goncourt, the distinguished French writer and collector:--

"My wish is that my Drawings, my Prints, my Curiosities, my
Books--in a word, these things of Art which have been the
joy of my life--shall not be consigned to the cold tomb of a
Museum, and subjected to the stupid glance of the careless
passer-by; but I require that they shall all be dispersed
under the hammer of the auctioneer, so that the pleasure
which the acquiring of each one of them has given me shall
be given again, in each case, to some inheritor of my own
tastes."

A list of those whose libraries have been dispersed at public auction
would contain an astonishing proportion of names great in the world's
history. Even in cases where the collections were not directly
dispersed by the auction method, it will be found that the bulk of the
more important works contained therein had, at some previous period,
passed through the auctio