goatskin): there are no
alternatives if durability be our aim; calf, of course, we have learnt
long ago to eschew. No leather, except Russia, perishes more quickly or
more easily. Rather have a book bound in cloth than in calf any day.
Buckram is good and stands fairly rough handling; it is useful for
binding catalogues and cheap books. See that your binder gives you good
thick boards when he clothes your books in buckram.

Years ago, when books were most commonly bound in calf, a custom arose of
stamping the lettering on thin pieces of leather of a different colour
from the binding, and these were stuck on to the back of the book. There
is no doubt that these leather labels have _sometimes_ a pleasing effect,
and for a time the custom was very popular. But it is a bad habit.
Besides the meretricious effect generally produced, the paste which holds
the label to the back of the book perishes in time, and the label drops
off. A visit to any large second-hand bookshop will afford an admirable
illustration of the result of this habit. Here one may see sets of
Shakespeare's works and other classics which present a most woebegone
appearance owing to several of the volumes having shed their labels. The
only excuse for this custom that I have ever heard urged, is that one
always knows when to rebind volumes so adorned: it is when the labels
begin to fall.

As to the merits and demerits of the different coloured moroccos, you
will find these fully dealt with in the bookbinding manuals. White and
black we are warned against especially. The bookbinding authorities tell
us that vellum, if exposed to a strong light, perishes and chips off like
egg-shell; and we are warned to place vellum bound volumes with their
backs to the wall, lettering the fore-edge with pen and ink, as was often
done of old. But if kept away from the windows this precaution seems to
be unnecessary. The beautiful brown vellum used for binding and repairing
old books by Messrs. John Ramage and Son is very attractive and is,
perhaps, as durable a binding as it is possible to have. Possibly other
bookbinders use it, though I do not remember to have seen it used by any
other firm. So far as I am aware this firm is the only one in London
capable of executing work of the very highest class at a price within the
means of the modest collector.

It has been said that there are only four bookbinders in London who may
be trusted not to mutilate a book, and that there ar