England a great destruction of books
took place. The antiquarian Bale, writing in 1587, thus speaks of the
shameful fate of the Monastic libraries:--

"A greate nombre of them whyche purchased those superstycyouse mansyons
(_Monasteries_) reserved of those librarye bookes some to serve their
jakes, some to scoure theyr candelstyckes, and some to rubbe theyr
bootes. Some they solde to the grossers and sope sellers, and some they
sent over see to yeS booke bynders, not in small nombre, but at tymes
whole shyppes full, to yeS, wonderynge of foren nacyons. Yea yeS.
Universytees of thys realme are not alle clere in thys detestable fact.
But cursed is that bellye whyche seketh to be fedde with suche ungodlye
gaynes, and so depelye shameth hys natural conterye. I knowe a merchant
manne, whych shall at thys tyme be namelesse, that boughte yeS contentes
of two noble lybraryes for forty shyllynges pryce: a shame it is to be
spoken. Thys stuffe hathe heoccupyed in yeS stede of greye paper, by
yeS, space of more than these ten yeares, and yet he bathe store ynoughe
for as manye years to come. A prodygyous example is thys, and to be
abhorred of all men whyche love theyr nacyon as they shoulde do. The
monkes kepte them undre dust, yeS, ydle-headed prestes regarded them
not, theyr latter owners have most shamefully abused them, and yeS
covetouse merchantes have solde them away into foren nacyons for
moneye."

How the imagination recoils at the idea of Caxton's translation of the
Metamorphoses of Ovid, or perhaps his "Lyf of therle of Oxenforde,"
together with many another book from our first presses, not a fragment
of which do we now possess, being used for baking "pyes."

At the Great Fire of London in 1666, the number of books burnt was
enormous. Not only in private houses and Corporate and Church libraries
were priceless collections reduced to cinders, but an immense stock
of books removed from Paternoster Row by the Stationers for safety was
burnt to ashes in the vaults of St. Paul's Cathedral.

Coming nearer to our own day, how thankful we ought to be for the
preservation of the Cotton Library. Great was the consternation in the
literary world of 1731 when they heard of the fire at Ashburnham House,
Westminster, where, at that time, the Cotton MSS. were deposited. By
great exertions the fire was conquered, but not before many MSS. had
been quite destroyed and many others injured. Much skill was shown
in the partial restor