s the world has grown wiser in
respect to books as well as other things, executors, legatees, and so
forth, have acquired unreasonable views as to the value of old books,
and everything in the shape of a volume is sent to the regular
book-auctioneers. When it is remembered that practically all the books
which now occur on the various bookstalls of the Metropolis are
purchased under the hammer at Hodgson's, the chances of obtaining
anything rare are reduced to a minimum. These books are the refuse of
the various bookshops, after, perhaps, having passed from one shop to
another for several years without finding a purchaser outside the trade.
At Hodgson's, of course, these books find their level, after repeated
appearances; they are here sold, not quite by the cartload, but
certainly in lots sufficiently large to fill a moderate sized
wheelbarrow. The tastes of the bookbuying public are so infinite that
there would seem to be a sale, at some time or another, for every
species of printed matter; but the habitual haunter of the bookstalls
meets with the same water-soaked dog-eared volumes month after month,
and year after year, so that he is forced to the conclusion that the
right purchaser has not yet come along. These volumes appeal to the
bookbuyer with a piteousness which is scarcely less than positively
human. In the words of George Peele, written over three centuries ago,
these books seem to say,

'Buy, read and judge,
The price do not grudge;
It will give thee more pleasure
Than twice as much treasure;'

but no one seems to take the hint. Samuel Foote, in 'The Author,' makes
Vamp say: 'Books are like women, Master Cape; to strike they must be
well dressed; fine feathers make fine birds: a good paper, an elegant
type, a handsome motto, and a catching title, has drove many a dull
treatise through three editions.' These adventitious aids may still
possess a potent influence in selling a new book even to-day, but they
have little effect on the sale of the books which gravitate towards the
book-barrow.

The bookstall-keeper, it is true, has no rent to pay, except for the
hire of his barrow, which amounts to one shilling per week each. Even
this small charge is a considerable item where a man hires two or three
barrows and does scarcely any trade. Then he has to pay someone to look
after his goods during his absence. Further than this, the barrow-man
has to pay cash down before he removes his pur