gement analogous to this was adopted at Citeaux, as we may gather
from the catalogue, drawn up in 1480. I will not trouble you with
details, but merely say that there was evidently a shelf below the desk as
well as one above it. The cases therefore resembled those at Leiden, with
this difference; and they were also probably of such a height that a
reader could conveniently sit at them.

On the continent, where elaborate bindings came early into fashion,
sometimes protected by equally elaborate bosses at their corners, it would
have been impossible to arrange the volumes as we did side by side on the
shelves. It therefore became the fashion to place a shelf below the desk,
and to lay the books upon it on their sides. The earliest library fitted
in this manner that I have been able to discover is at Cesena in North
Italy. It was built in 1452, by Domenico Malatesta Novello, for the
convent of S. Francesco. It is possible, therefore, that the parent house
of S. Francesco at Assisi, which had a large library, divided, so early as
1381, into a _Libreria publica_ and a _Libreria secreta_, had similar
bookcases. I am going to shew you a general view of the room, which has a
thoroughly medieval character, next the cases (fig. 6), and thirdly a
single book with its chain (fig. 7). You will observe that the seats for
the reader are no longer independent, but are combined with the bookcase.

[Illustration: FIG. 6. Bookcases at west end of south side of Library,
Cesena.]

These cases no doubt suggested those in the Medicean library at Florence,
begun in 1525 by Michael Angelo. The cases, perhaps the finest specimens
in existence of wood-carving as applied to this style of work, were
designed by other artists shortly after the completion of the room.

[Illustration: FIG. 7. Part of a single bookcase in the Library, Cesena.]

_Bookcase in the Medicean Library at Florence._

In English libraries at least bookcases arranged on what I may term the
Oxford type were in general use throughout the sixteenth and seventeenth
centuries. The invention of printing had largely increased the number of
volumes, and at the same time diminished their value, so that chaining was
no longer necessary. When it had been abandoned neither a desk, nor a seat
in close proximity to the books, was required. In consequence, though
libraries continued to be built on the ancient type with numerous windows
close to the floor, it was possible to alter the o