ht, Messrs. Longman and Co. determined upon embarking in
such a lucrative branch of the trade; they applied to Hill for advice
and assistance, offering to begin by the purchase of his entire
collection, a proposition which he embraced with alacrity. He drew up a
_catalogue raisonne_ of his books, affixing his price for each volume.
The collection was despatched in three or four trunks to Paternoster
Row, and he received in payment the acceptances of the firm for as many
thousand pounds. From some cause or other, the purchasers soon repented
of their bargain, but the only terms which Horace Smith could obtain for
the Longmans was an extension in the term of payment. Hill declared that
the collection was worth double the price he had been paid for it. For
many years Hill assisted Perry, of the _Morning Chronicle_, in making
selections of rare books for his fine library at Tavistock House,
particularly in the department of facetiae. After leaving Sydenham, Hill
took chambers in James Street, Adelphi, where he resided until his
death. The walls of his rooms were completely hidden by books, and his
couch was 'enclosed in a lofty circumvallation of volumes piled up from
the carpet.' He was never married, had no relations, and even his age
was a source of mystery to his friends. James Smith once said to him:
'The fact is, Hill, the register of your birth was destroyed in the
Great Fire of London, and you take advantage of the accident to conceal
your real age.' Hook went further by suggesting that he might originally
have been one of the little hills recorded as skipping in the Psalms.
Hill died in 1840, his age being placed at eighty-three years. Horace
Smith said 'he could not believe that Hill was dead, and he could not
insult a man he had known so long; Hill would reappear.'

[Illustration: _Thomas Hill, after Maclise._]

Samuel Rogers, the banker poet, was also a book-collector, but not in
the sense of one who aims at number. His house at 22, St. James's Place,
overlooking Green Park, was for over half a century--he had removed
here from the Temple about 1803--one of the most celebrated
meeting-places of literature and art in London. Byron, in his 'Diary,'
says, 'If you enter his house--his drawing-room, his library--you of
yourself say, This is not the dwelling of a common mind. There is not a
gem, a coin, a book, thrown aside on his chimney-piece, his sofa, his
table, that does not bespeak an almost fastidious elegance