THE   PRINTED   BOOK,

Fig. 64.—Plantin's mark

ing its own until then, gave way little by little before this invasion. When Henri IV. mounted the throne wood engraving had finished its upward movement, it still remained in the canards, or popular pieces sold at low prices, but it is easy to see what these hasty vignettes are worth.
      We have now seen the history of the Book and its decoration in the sixteenth century in France : at first French epics in Italy, books of hours, romances of chivalry ; then about 1550, with the reign of Henri II., the religious pamphlets commenced, bookselling spread itself ; the strife between illustrations on metal plates and those in relief assumed shape, it continued under Henri III., and terminated abruptly by the victory of the first at the extreme end of the century. With political passions, printing had become a weapon of warfare, which it will never cease to be. They knew in the sixteenth century what perfidious accusations or excessive praises were worth. The Book followed the fate of its author. If the writer was burned, so was his book. Witness the Christianismi Restitutio of the Catholic Servetus, printed at Vienne, in Dauphiné, and consigned to the flames with its author at Geneva in 1553. A single copy was saved from the fire, and is now preserved in the Bibliothèque Nationale ; it is the identical copy annotated by Colladon, the accuser of the unhappy Servetus, and still bears traces of fire on its leaves.
      Typography and the illustration of the Book in England in the sixteenth century did not make the same progress as in France and Italy. Much good work was done, but it was mostly with foreign material. Type was obtained from French and Dutch founders,

and most of the woodcuts had the same origin. In the early part of the century most of the publications were translations of popular foreign books, such as Voragine's " Golden Legend," Caxton's translations of Cicero, Boetius, etc. Too many restrictions and privileges obtained to encourage or allow of the establishment of an English school, which was to come later with the spread of wealth and education. Books were mostly printed in Gothic type, or " black letter," and the woodcuts were of the coarsest kind. An exception was the beautiful Prayer-book of John Day, 1578, known as Queen Elizabeth's Prayer-book, from the fine portrait of the Queen, which we reproduce, on the previous page ; but in this the woodcuts were designed by Albert Dürer and Hans Holbein. Pynson was the first to use Roman type in England, in the Oratio in pace nuperrimâ, 1518, quarto ; and the first English Bible in Roman type was printed at Edinburgh in 1576. It is thought that until about 1600 printers were their own type-founders, as no record exists of founding as a separate trade until that time.
      The greatest achievement of the sixteenth century in England was the printing of the first English Bible, in Coverdale's translation, in 1535, folio, but even this was printed abroad, the latest investigation giving it to Van Meteren at Antwerp. The woodcuts in it are by Hans Sebald Beham ; we reproduce one representing Cain killing Abel. Tyndall had previously printed abroad an English New Testament. Another importation was Brandt's "Shyp of Folys," printed by Pynson, 1509, and John Cawood, 1570, the woodcuts in both being copied from the originals before referred to.

      Folio was the size usually adopted, and in this size the series of chronicles appeared : Arnold, printed abroad in 1502 ; Fabian, in 1516 ; Froissart, by Pynson, in two volumes, 1523-5 ; Harding, by Grafton, 1543 ; Hall, by the same, 1548 ; Holinshed, in two volumes, 1577. In the same size Chaucer was first given to the world entire by T. Godfrey in 1532, and many times reprinted, and Sir Thomas More in 1557.

      The first specimen of copper plate engraving for books in England is a frontispiece to Galen's De Temperamentis, printed at Cambridge 1521, and the number of books containing copper plates engraved before 1600 is extremely limited, the most notable being portraits of Queen Elizabeth, Lord Leicester, and Lord Burleigh in Archbishop Parker's Bible of 1568 ; Saxton's Atlas, 1579, the first atlas in England ;

CHAPTER IV.

Fig. 69.—Letter engraved by A. Bosse.

became difficult to steer safely among the prohibitions. Enormous numbers of works were made with frontispieces decorated with colonnades and mitred saints, and bearing high-sounding titles of sound orthodoxy. A somewhat gross mysticism, from the office of Plantin, formed the most solid stock of every respectable dealer.
      Under Henri IV. and the minority of Louis XIII., two French illustrators received from the school of Antwerp their inspiration for the ornament of the Book. Thomas de Leu, probably from Flanders, was allied with the old Parisian painter and engraver of celebrated portraits, Antoine Caron, in furnishing the engraved plates for the Images de Plate Peinture des Deux Philostrates, Sophistes Grecs, Paris, Claude Cramoisy, 1609, folio ; and Leonard Gaultier, his contemporary, collaborated with Jaspar Isaac and other artists in the Book. Leonard Gaultier contributed most to spread in France the Plantinian style, and his somewhat cold but characteristic talent suited this art more than that of any one else then could. He was an engraver of portraits, now rare and valuable, in the style of Wierix or Thomas de Leu ; but, at the demand of publishers and booksellers, he composed other plates, at first historical figures representing the royal family and the nobles for the publisher Leclerc, in a simple and true manner ; he also designed pious figures, recording a miracle or representing the ceremonies of a jubilee and other devotional things. But he made his great success in the composition of frontispieces to theological and pious works, printed for nearly all the booksellers. Leonard Gaultier had a fashion of his own with pilasters and Grecian columns, under which he boldly placed entire councils of cardinals / LEONARD GAULTIER.  p.155 / and bishops ; witness the heading of the Bibliotheca Veterum Patrum, into which he crowded nearly forty figures. He united also with a certain grace the sacred and the profane, placing among ideal saints the sinning fine ladies of the time, with their large collarettes and jewels falling on naked breasts. The work of Andrew Valladier, chaplain of the King, entitled Métanéalogie Sacrée, published by Peter Chevalier in 1609, was adorned with a title of this particular kind, in which Gaultier had no rival, and which preserves the precision of Flemish masters in the detail of ornaments of the toilet.
      He was one of the first to work for Sebastian Cramoisy, printer and publisher, who had established his shop in the Rue St. Jacques at the sign of the "Stork." We shall have occasion to speak of him later in connection with the Royal Printing House, of which he was the first director ; he is mentioned now because in 1611 Leonard Gaultier engraved for him the frontispiece of L'Aigle Français, a collection of sermons by Thomas Girault. The publisher used the same plate in 1618 for the sermons of Raymond de Hézèque.
      Besides the publications of Sebastian Cramoisy and Chevallier, Leonard Gaultier adorned also those of Nicholas Buon and many other publishers of the time in Paris and Lyons. With such a profusion of works emanating from a single artist, without reckoning those which were produced in great quantity by men of less note, wood engraving was dead. At most it dared to put a wood block of a printer's mark on a title ; more ordinarily this mark was not alone sufficient, and showed the disdain in which taste then held wood- / p.156 / cutting. Thus goes fashion, heedless of the most elementary rules of art. To put type within an engraved title, or to ornament a printed text with engravings, is a heresy of principle that was established in the eighteenth century, by the strength of its cleverness and talent. But at the beginning of the seventeenth, in spite of Leonard Gaultier or Thomas de Leu, these overloaded titles, overpowering the opening of the Book, offend the eye by their excessive blackness, and incontestably make us regret the admirable frontispiece on wood of the preceding century.
      This is all the ornament, properly so called, of the reign of Louis XIII. Leonard Gaultier composed also small vignettes for an edition of Homer, but they are mediocre and unskilful, and it must be said that there were others following the same path. John Picart made a frontispiece with architecture and figures for the Histoire de la Maison de Châtillon-sur-Marne for account of Sebastian Cramoisy. A cold and hard artist he was, the rival of Gaultier, and one of the most employed of the vignette engravers of Paris. There was also Jaspar Isaac, a mediocre craftsman, but who could design clever titles, among them that of the continuation of the Annales of Baronius for the publisher Denis de la Noue. Then Claude Mellan, whose great and clever talent did not disdain second-rate works, in which he gave free play to his burin. It must be said, however, that his bold touch did not well accommodate itself to reduced spaces, and that he was not working in the field necessary to his inventive powers. We mention his portrait of Louis XIV. at the head of the Code Louis XIV.; the title of the Perfection du Chrestien, in which

      In Holland, artists were rather numerous. The family of the Passes designed vignettes for books, and engraved frontispieces, admirably studied and composed. The clear and truly personal style of their works places their illustrations in the first rank among those of their time. They had, at the same time, the genius that created and the intelligent burin that faithfully translated an idea. They imagined with art the scenes that they depicted without at all copying their predecessors. From 1599, the date of the publication of the Hortus Deliciarum, one of their best works, up to about 1623, they were in Holland, at Arnheim and at Amsterdam. In 1623 we find one of them, the most celebrated, Crispin the younger, designing figures for the Manège Royal of Pluvinel, published by Angelier in Paris, and for another edition, with folding plates, in 1624 for William Lenoir, at the sign of the "White Rose Crowned." This magnificent work, in which the King, Louis XIII., is represented receiving lessons from the rider Pluvinel, had a third and more complete reimpression in 1625 with another publisher, Michael Nivelle. Here we see the Dutch accredited in France, in Paris, in the city then the most ready to understand and pay for the works of eminent artists. In 1624 Gombauld published an Endymion—Boileau later associated Gombauld with other poets to declare him a maker of pitiable sonnets—Nicholas Buon, the bookseller named above, undertook the publication, and employed Pass, Leonard Gaultier, and J. Picart to furnish plates in octavo size. Heavy and black as were these vignettes, they do not the less make a good appearance in the edition of the forgotten

poet ; and it is due to truth to recognise how much Pass was above his collaborators. The following year, 1625, he engraved the Dionysiaques of Nonus, for Robert Fouet, and the Roman des Romans of Du Verdier, comprising more than ten engravings, in a very free and bold manner. The Berger Extravagant and the Académie de l'Espée came in 1628, among numerous others.
      To speak truly, Crispin Pass did not devote himself entirely to Parisian publishers ; he always preserved interests in Flanders so as to return there from time to time ; but he did not find in his own country the ready and assured sales of Paris. Still the city of Leyden had then one of the most renowned workshops of typography ; the Elzevirs had commenced to make a good place for themselves among the printers of Europe by the extreme correctness of their editions, the distinctness of their work, and their marvellous art in the taste and economy of the Book. In reality, the sizes and characters of their books were very small, but if the smallness of the page did not allow room for vignette or ornament, they bore a certain practical elegance that was not without charm. The origin of the printing house was due to Louis Elzevir, who published in 1592 an edition of Eutropius at Leyden. He left sons, who associated themselves together, and founded a house which was unrivalled.
      Bonaventure Elzevir, grandson of Louis, was the most illustrious of this family, so remarkably devoted to its art. He took Abraham as partner, and together they put forth those little Latin classics in duodecimo of which the value is now so great. Among others, Pliny issued from their presses in the year 1635, in three / THE ELZEVIRS.  p.163 / volumes, Virgil in 1636, and Cicero in 1642. To-day amateurs, above all those afflicted with bibliomania, hunt for unbound Elzevirs, because they have full

      With Abraham Bosse the decoration of the Book took a considerable extension. Numerous and charming ornamented letters, heads of pages, and tailpieces appear. There are few artists that have done so much as he for graceful illustration and harmony between the vignette and the printed page. His prodigious fecundity made him attempt every style ; and after the gaieties of the print in which he laughed with his contemporaries, he adopted a grave air to trace more severe subjects on copper. However, the book entitled La Manière Universelle, by Desargues, with numerous geometrical figures and an agreeable frontispiece, bearing the dedication to the Seigneur de Noyers, superintendent of the Royal Printing House, was a critical work, in which Bosse, under a serious standard, did not spare an enemy. We do not bear ill-will to the artist, however, for the following year he published fourteen plates for the Suetonius printed at the Louvre.
      He successively designed plates for the Histoire de St. Louis, numerous vignettes for pious books, figures for the Pucelle of Chapelain and for the Larcins de la Fortune. He was always himself, refined and ingenious, whether in the most barren or the most complicated subjects.
      He has left us in a celebrated print a representation of a bookseller's shop of his time. It is for us an interesting page, in which is shown simply and rather naïvely the picturesque side of these stores, with the dealer and his wife selling new works to their customers. The shop is compact, and very much like the open-air stalls of to-day ; posting-bills above the shelves indicate the " new books ;" and if the in-

      It may be imagined what an engraver could produce working from 1650 and dying in 1715, that is, a life of work the longest that could be hoped for. Leclerc was the absolute contemporary of the King. He died, like him, at the beginning of the eighteenth century, leaving work widely scattered among books, funeral orations and placards. After the example of Callot and Bosse, he did not disdain satire. One of his prettiest vignettes served to illustrate some pamphlet of Richesource against the journalists of his time ; it represents a dandy of about 1679 offering his gazette.
      By the side of this unrivalled antagonist it is permitted to place Lepautre, twenty years older than Leclerc, but whose studies had been principally on architecture. In the moments that he left his special work he devoted himself to frontispieces and vignettes ; nevertheless, although he had before him the charming designs of Leclerc, he confined himself to a cold and hard manner, keeping, besides, as much as possible to titles, in which his particular talent could find scope. He designed also the Chartreux Missal of 1679, the Gallia Christiana after Marot, the Dioptrique Oculaire of P. Chérubin, engraved by Edelinck, and a thousand other works of small repute.
      Very different was Francis Chauveau, who, without having the delicacy of Sébastien Leclerc or his art of arrangement, treated at least with grace little figures and illustrations. Certainly there is an enormous distance between these correct and commonplace engraved plates and the delightful wood engravings of the time of Geoffroy Tory, for example. But, be / LECLERC, LEPAUTRE, CHAUVEAU.  p.179 / their worth what it may, they suited very well ; and even with Molière they did not make such a bad figure. Chauveau was associated with many of the

CHAPTER V.

THE BOOK IN THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY.

   Fig. 79.—Letter by Cochin for the Mém­oires d'Artillerie of Suvirey de St. Remy.

      Laurent Cars was the engraver who multiplied the compositions of Boucher, and made them the fashion. He engraved also, after the painter of shepherds and nymphs, illustrations to Molière, the most agreeable that there are for style and spirit. In engraving certain works of Lemoyne, Cars did not completely desert the ancient school. He appears at the beginning of the eighteenth century as if divided between two manners each equally possible to him.
      The work of these engravers was almost exclusively in etching, biting with acid a copper plate covered with varnish, on which the drawing was made by means of a point. This process, always previously used for sketches, served also for finishing vignettes, which up to then had been finished by the burin. The suppleness of the work was greater, and the artist remained more himself than he could be with the stiff cutting instrument of the seventeenth century.
      The sizes of books had not yet all come to octavo or duodecimo. The works of Molière published by Prault in 1734 in six volumes quarto, under the direction of Marc Antoine Joly, give the idea of an important work, not at all of theatrical pieces. To tell the truth, these somewhat exaggerated dimensions allow artists more room for illustration ; later, when smaller forms predominated, text and engravings were so compressed that they were not always clear and readable to every eye ; but the quarto was not graceful, it was not in harmony with the finikin, the pastoral pieces, then presented, and it had to disappear as a current size in illustrated publications.
      The class of artisans employed on the Book is not / p.190 / identical in the eighteenth century with that of printers and publishers. In the beginning as we have seen, the cutters of wood blocks and the printers were often the same people, preparing their characters or their blocks, and afterwards putting them under the press. Large printing offices had very quickly changed that. Each particular work had its special workman. Typography had its type-founders, compositors, forwarders, inkers, and pressmen. In the eighteenth century this was complicated by designers, engravers, plate-printers, and these different professions occupied themselves on the Book in manipulating the sheets in their turn. In the midst of this crowd, the designers and engravers, esteemed as was their collaboration, were not the most honoured. Their homes often reflected the effect of their life as clever artists, quick to spend the money earned during the week ; and we shall have occasion to name some of the more miserable among them.
      The booksellers, on the contrary, had become great personages. In the preceding chapter we have seen Cramoisy and Vitré, to name only them, acquire the greatest honours, the latter painted by Philip de Champagne, with many others lords of the court. In the eighteenth century there were Brunet, Ballard, Mariette, Chardon, Didot, and a host of others, during the time of Watteau, Boucher, and Cars, of which we shall shortly speak ; and these several publishers had houses of their own, and furnished shops and printing offices with the best apparatus. Saved from falling into negligences by royal regulations on printing, they composed with admirable characters, on paper of the first order, imperishable works ; and, usual consequence of their / COCHIN.  p.191 / high situation, they paid the artists badly charged with their work. It would be long and tedious to enter into this matter in detail. They made progress by slow degrees, and in good time they marvellously united copper plate engraving to printed text, so marvellously, that in comparing their works to the wood blocks of

      Nearly all the frontispieces of the Book with vignettes of the eighteenth century preserve this arrangement : an ornamented and draped border, with garlands of roses, symbols, and cupids, in the middle the title, in red and black, composed in open letter, often a scroll with the address of the publisher, but rarely a mark. It was the time of little winged cupids, goddesses, and gods. The goddesses were the favourites of the kings, Madame de Pompadour or the princesses, but rarely the virtuous Marie Leczinska, too homely and too much ignored to tempt the artists ; the kings or the princes were the gods.
      After Jombert, Prault, and Coustellier, Cochin worked for François Didot, syndic of the printers, for whom he prepared a set of illustrations to Molière. Unfortunately Didot died in 1757, and the project fell with him. Of the work of Cochin there only remains the set of Tartufe etchings in octavo.
      In the vortex into which he was plunged, he successively illustrated the works of Rousseau, published at Brussels, quarto ; those of Boileau, published by David and Durand, octavo ; and Henault's "History of France," in the same size, with numerous vignettes. One of these should be noted in a book treating of printing ; it is that in which Cochin pretends to show to his contemporaries the interior of a workshop in 1470. Without doubt the sketch of this print was taken in one of the houses frequented by him—at Jombert's, Didot's, or David and Durand's—for that room in which compositors are working and printed sheets drying was not an invention of Cochin, and served to reproduce a printing office of the eighteenth century.

      With Cochin soon worked a number of designers and aqua-fortists, too prudent to lose the opportunity. The fashion arrived for books beribboned, festooned, and flowered. Hubert François Gravelot had carried to London this style of new works, which he knew how to decorate, in his manner, better than any one, with letters, figures, and tailpieces. He did not engrave much himself, leaving this work to lesser artists, and contenting himself with subtle invention and graceful subjects. With Eisen, Cochin, and Moreau, he is the French artist in the sense of the time, free, bold, and ingenious, but perhaps a little out of place in England. He published his plates to the "Decameron" in 1757, one of the most curious of his sets of plates, and a hundred various vignettes. On his return to France he designed the Théâtre of P. Corneille, from which the Galerie de Palais is here reproduced, on account of the illustration of bookselling which it gives. In 1764 the large salon of the Palace was still, as in the time of Abraham Bosse, a place where shops were fitted up and the new books discussed. Side by side with the dressmakers and merchants of every category, the bookseller offers to his customer the recent products of Parisian presses. Certain works were sold under cover and not shown ; there is here something to pique the curiousity of unoccupied young men who strolled about and prolonged their stay in the galleries.
      Eisen has a simplicity, a good taste, and a special and singularly perfect economy of artistic effect combined with typography. It appears hard that the designer had no consultative voice in the choice of impression and disposition of the Book. The union of the two forces,

	the vignette and the com- position, is so close that it may be believed one was made for the other, neither venturing to assert itself. In the pretty and elaborate inventions of the artists reigned a lackadaisical affectation that was delightfully becoming ; the rock-work, which it still had, suited admirably the borders of the first page. The Lettres d'une Peruvienne has a very agreeable title, but little different, on the whole, from that of Madame Deshoulières, by Cochin. It is the same with the Lettres Turques, published at Amsterdam in 1750, and generally in all the frontispieces signed by him. As to the other decorations of the Book,

there were also a number of ingenious artists, confusing cupids and flowers, imposing blazons, delighting in playing with accumulated difficulties. Under this assuredly involuntary but real direction, publications attained proportions of luxury and coquetry until then unknown. The volume of Baisers of Dorat would not have lived but for Eisen and the delightful fancies with which he adorned it.
      At the same time, we find Choffard, another designer and etcher of much repute, and sought after by the booksellers. Under his pencil the vignette became a chef-d'œuvre, the tailpiece was a delightful compound of judicious and sportive ornament, the taste for which grew more and more. From delicate foliage are suspended roses, shepherds' pipes, lyres, and zithers. With the zephyrs scrolls or ribbons float, carried by winged cupids. The initial letters are real pictures, of such fineness and precision that the difficulties of their reproduction prevent us from putting them before the reader.
      When the fermiers généraux, those great amateur financiers of the last century, conceived the idea of an edition of the Contes of La Fontaine at their expense, their eyes naturally fell upon the artists best prepared to illustrate the inimitable fancies of the great poet, Eisen and Choffard. The first had for his task the composition of the plates, Choffard the general decoration. Ficquet was added for the portrait of the bonhomme La Fontaine—Ficquet, whose specialty in this genre was dazzling in its delicacy and spirit ; Diderot wrote a short introduction ; the composition was confided to a printer of the first order, and it was put on sale by Barbou.

      It is not a book to be recommended from a moral point of view, but the typographical art, joined to that of designers and engravers, never obtained a more com-

Meilleurs Contes en Vers, 1778, and many other books, after having worked for Didot, devoted himself to patriotic engraving and to the reproduction of scenes of the Revolution. When he published his Tableaux Historiques, in three volumes folio, adorned with nearly two hundred large plates, it was under the Consulate, that is to say far from the time when the work was begun. Renouvier assures us, with his exclusive disdain for the eighteenth century, that Duplessis-Bertaux was a mystifier, and that his scenes of the Revolution were a hoax, "in the kind of spirit in vogue under the Directory." The truth is that the artist, in place of being a cheerful Callot, as might be thought from his manner of engraving, so like that of the Lorraine artist, was imbued with the emphatic and exaggerated impressions of the first Republic, its sans-culottes in the poses of the Sabines and its tricoteuses apeing Penelope.
      The immense artistic advance made in France in the eighteenth century in the manufacture and illustration of the Book made itself felt throughout Europe. In Germany, Chodowiecki, born at Dantzic of a family of apothecaries, developed his talent from ornamenting the boxes of his father, and from 1758 to 1794 he designed numerous plates for books and almanacs, a little heavy in engraving but singularly clever in composition. There were a few others also designing, and Kilian, Folkema, and Ridinger produced some fine engravings, but the Book did not make so much progress in Germany as in France and England.
      In England a vast improvement was manifested. Fine types were cast by Baskerville and Caslon ; printing machines were perfected. The illustration of books / ENGLISH BOOKS OF THE 18TH CENTURY.  p.209 / by engraved plates was in the first half of the century almost entirely done by foreigners, but an English school was arising, which attained perfection in the latter half of the eighteenth and first half of the nineteenth century. Wood engraving also, which, with the exception of blocks for head and tailpieces, had become almost a lost art, was revived by Bewick, to become later one of the chief adornments of the Book.
     Before 1716 English printers obtained their best founts of type from Holland, but the establishment of the Caslon foundry rendered them independent. William Caslon, the first great English type-founder, was born 1692, and died 1766. The foundry still exists, pre-eminent in the beauty of its characters. Baskerville established a foundry about 1750, and printed at Birmingham with his own types a number of extremely beautiful books. The impetus given to fine printing by these two men rapidly spread itself, and laid the foundation of the perfection which English bookmaking reached.
      As mentioned above, Gravelot illustrated many English books in the early part of the century. He designed a set of plates to Shakespeare in 12mo, 1740, and another in quarto, 1744, besides numerous frontispieces and other plates in all kinds of books. Among other foreigners who engraved for English publishers were Grignion, Kip, Van der Gucht, Houbraken, and Bartolozzi. Bartolozzi, who was very prolific in the production of engraved plates, may perhaps be called the founder of that great English school of engraving which arose with the establishment of the Royal Academy in 1769 and the encouragement given / p.210 / by Alderman Boydell. Houbraken and Vertue engraved a set of fine portraits in folio for Rapin's " History of England," 1736 ; William Hogarth designed plates for Butler's " Hudibras," 1744 ; and among other curiousities of English engraving before 1750 were Sturt's edition of the Common Prayer, entirely engraved on copper plates, 1717, and an edition of Horace entirely engraved by Pine, 1733. That the taste for illustrated books soon grew to be great is evidenced by the publication of such expensive works as Boydell's edition of Shakespeare, in nine volumes folio, commenced in 1791, and adorned with a hundred plates from pictures specially commissioned by the spirited publisher ; Claude's Liber Veritatis, with three hundred engravings by Richard Earlom 1777, Sir Robert Strange's engravings of fifty historical prints about 1750, collections of views in Great Britain by Kip, Buck, and Boydell ; Holbein's "Collection of Portraits" 1792, a hundred and fifty plates to Shakespeare engraved by S. and E. Harding 1793, all of which cost great sums to produce, and greatly contributed to the elevation of public taste. Among the artists of the latter half of the century who contributed to the decoration of the Book are Thomas Stothard, whose very beautiful designs, extending into the next century, excelled those of all his contemporaries in their grace and spirit ; Robert Smirke, best known by his plates for Shakespeare, " Don Quixote," and " Gil Blas;" Burney ; and Richard Westall. It may be said generally that the English books of the eighteenth century were of a more solid character than the French, although English art, especially in the decoration of the / REVIVAL OF WOOD ENGRAVING.  p.211 / Book, owes much to French initiation. It is curious to read now the opinion of a contemporary French engraver on English art. Choffard, in the preface to Basan's Dictionnaire 1767, wrote, "They" (the English), "having been supported by some foreign talent, are trying to create talent among themselves ; but they have not seized the flame of genius that vivifies all art in France."

CHAPTER VI.

THE BOOK IN THE NINETEENTH CENTURY.

      In Germany perhaps the most remarkable achievement of the century is the extraordinary series of volumes of English authors, now (1887) numbering 2,500, issued by Baron Tauchnitz, of Leipzig, which, although eminently popular in their character, are well and tastefully printed. Among the most notable of the printing and publishing houses of Germany, many of them combining the two trades, are J. G. Cotta, dating from 1640 ; Breitkopf and Härtel, dating from 1719 ; Justus Perthes, founded 1796 ; T. O. Weigel, 1797 ; F. A. Brockhaus, 1805 ; B. G. Teubner, 1811 ; W. Drugulin, 1829 ; J. J. Weber, 1834, etc. Germany has advanced with England and France in fine typography and illustration in their several kinds. The modern school of book illustration in Germany undoubtedly has its origin in the influence given to it by the designs of the artist Adolph Menzel, amongst which a series of two hundred illustrations to the works of Frederick the Great, engraved on wood by the Vogels, Unzelman and Müller, show him to be one of the most powerful and accurate draughtsmen of the century.
      To return to France, a new literature arose that was to react against the Greek full of Gallicisms ; but the movement, in reversing the ancient state of things, in wishing to replace antiquity by the Middle Ages, old Romans by old French, completely changed the physiognomy of the Book. The engraved vignette and the copper plate of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries were to lose their supremacy and to give way to etching and wood engraving, also a revival of the Middle Ages.
      It is not sufficiently known that wood engraving, after the unfortunate attempts of Papillon in France, / WOOD ENGRAVING REVIVED.  p.225 / was restored in England by Thomas Bewick, who founded a school, of which, at the commencement of our century, Clennell and the brothers Thompson were members. One of the Thompsons went to France about the middle of the Restoration, doubtless with the hope of profiting by his art, and he offered to the Print

      Curmer acknowledges the importance of English specialists in this new process for vignettes, and the willing publishers were not wanting ; they came from all parts. He himself did not stop on the way ; he continued his work on a large scale ; and Charles Blanc was able to say of him later, as well as of Furne,

Fig. 97.—Vignette by Gavarni for Paris Marié.

      In our days the great Paris publishers have returned to the books of the eighteenth century, ornamented with vignettes on copper ; many of them purely and simply imitate by photographic processes the pretty editions of Eisen and Moreau, but they do not merit the name which they bear. As to those whose specialty is handsome books with figures by contemporary artists, those who always are in the front, as the Mames, Quantins, Hachettes, Plons, Jouausts,

CHAPTER VII.

TYPES, IMPRESSION, PAPER, INK.

      The first English printers used Gothic or black letter. Caxton brought his first fount from Cologne, but that which he made afterwards for himself was of the same character. Wynkyn de Worde, Pynson, and / EARLY TYPE-FOUNDERS.  p.241 / their successors used the same style ; and for official publications and Bibles the black letter was used up to the seventeenth century.
      But the art of the founder-engraver was destined to specialise itself. There were artisans in this

Fig. 102.—Type-founder in the middle of the sixteenth century. Engraving by Jost Amman.

branch, and among them in France, in the fifteenth century, Simon de Collines, who engraved good Roman characters about 1480. Later was Claude Garamond, of Paris, who died about 1561, a pupil of Geoffroy Tory, the most celebrated of all of them ; Tory definitely / p.242 / proscribed the Gothic character, of which Vostre and Verard had made constant use. Garamond worked in this way, producing with microscopical precision new letters, among others those of Robert Estienne, the most marvellous and the most distinct. It was he who was charged by Francis I. to form the celebrated royal Greek types. He assisted in getting up the Champfleury of Geoffroy Tory.
      On his death William Lebé succeeded him, and inherited his punches. Lebé engraved by preference Hebrew characters, of which he made a specialty. His travels to Rome and Venice had given him a singular value in his art ; and when he died about the end of the century, he was incontestably the first cutter of Oriental characters in the whole world. Philip II. of Spain had begged him to engrave the letters of the Bible of which Plantin had undertaken the impression, and Francis I. had charged him to make types for the Estiennes.
      At the commencement of the seventeenth century we find James Sanlecque, pupil of Lebé, and his son. During this period several women succeeded their husbands as type-founders. In the eighteenth century Philip Grandjean, an artist who was royal printer to Louis XIV., was keeper of the foundry afterwards united, in 1725, to the Royal Printing House ; Fournier succeeded the Lebés, then P. S. Fournier the younger, who engraved with great success. In our days we have seen above the Didots themselves working their punches ; and one of them, Henri, founded microscopical characters for a La Rochefoucauld about the middle of the nineteenth century.

/ TYPE-FOUNDING—THE FOUNT.  p.243 /

      We have referred to English type-founders of the eighteenth century in Chapter V.
      The type, or character used in printing, is a composition of lead and pure antimony, which, melted, form a resisting and at the same time supple mixture. Lead alone would be crushed, and the first printers often suffered in making their experiments. The proportion of the mixture is four of lead to one of antimony.
      The matrix is combined in such manner that the eye—that is to say, the part of the character intended to produce the impression—and also the shank intended to hold the letter are cast together.
      The letters, once founded according to their different forms, are afterwards disposed in boxes with compartments, or " cases." These cases serve to classify the character by letters, italics, capitals, lower case, punctuations, accents, etc.
      As we have said, the relation of letters among themselves in the composition of a language is called the " fount." For example, it is certain that the Italian employs the letter a more than b, the letter a appearing in nearly every word ; a compositor to compose in this language should therefore have more of a than of b. The relation between these two letters and all the others is the " fount." In French the proportion of a fount is about 5,000 a for 800 b, 3,000 c, 3,000 d, 11,000 e, etc. The fount varies with the languages. In English the proportion is 8,500 a to 1,600 b, 3,000 c, 4,400 d, etc.
      Before 1789 there were in all twenty different "bodies" of letters that bore fantastic names. The / p.244 / "Parisienne" was the smallest size, and the "Grosse Nonpareille" the largest. In the sixteenth century a character called "Civilité" was invented. It sought to imitate fine cursive writing. In the last century this idea was reproduced, and the " Bâtarde Coulée," which did not have great success, was made. In

English types, Joseph Moxon in 1669 had eleven sizes ; Caslon in 1734 had thirty-eight.
      When a printer wishes to compose a work, he first decides in which body he will print it. His choice made, he places in the compositors' "cases"— that is, in the boxes placed before each one of his workmen—the chosen character, with its italics, capitals, signs, etc. Then he gives them the " copy," that is to say the manuscript of the author to be reproduced. The com- / IMPOSITION.  p.245 / positors take a "galley" according to the size of the book ; and, letter by letter, by running their fingers through the different cases, they place side by side the words laboriously composed, and necessarily presenting their reverse, so that they will show their proper face when printed.
      The composition terminated, the process of "imposition" takes place. This is the disposition by pages in an iron chase, in such manner that the sheet of paper shall be printed on both sides, the pages exactly following one another.
      It will be seen by the specimen on the preceding page that if the two sheets be brought together, page 2 of II. will fall exactly opposite page 1 of I, page 7 opposite page 8, and so on. Nothing is easier than this combination for folio, quarto, or octavo sizes, but as the smaller sizes are multiplied even to 128mo, tables are necessary to prevent error.
      The imposition is completed by building up the composition in a chase by means of pieces of metal called " furniture," which regulate the margins. When the whole is in proper place, it is squeezed up and adjusted by means of sunk reglets. The chase may now be placed under the press without fear of the characters falling out or getting mixed.
      A pressman takes a "proof" after having rubbed the relief of the characters with ink, and on this proof are corrected the author's or compositor's faults by indications in the margin by understood signs. By this amended proof the compositor amends his faults one by one : leaves out superfluous characters, puts turned characters straight, spaces or draws closer the lines, etc.

/ p.246 /

      The corrections finished, the time has come to print. In the time of Geoffroy Tory this operation was made as we shall explain ; it was the same before and the same after. Two pressmen have tempered with water the tympan, or more elastic part of the carriage, against which will be directed in good time the blow from the type ; they have also damped the paper intended for the impression, so that it may retain the greasy ink with which the characters are charged ; then the formes are washed before putting them under the press.
      In the figure which we reproduce, which dates from about 1530, we see the workshop of Jodocus Badius, of Asch, father-in-law of two celebrated printers, Vascosan and Robert Estienne. The press rolls—that is to say, the formes—have been placed in the " carriage," or movable chase, which, coming forward, receives the sheet of paper and the ink, and returns under the press to receive the blow of the " bar." In the room, lighted by two windows, the compositors work. In front one works at the bar, while his comrade distributes the ink on the " balls." These balls are leather pads, on which the greasy ink, made of lampblack and oil, is spread, to more easily rub the forme after each blow. Ordinarily the inker had two functions : he prepared the ink, distributed it, and kept his eye on the printed sheets to correct faults, blots, and difference of tint. Here the workman is simply occupied by the balls. Printed sheets and prepared paper are on a table by the side of the press. This press is composed of the rolling chase, the tympan, and the " frisket," a smaller tympan, which work against one another. The tympan, we have said above, receives directly the blow. / PRESS WORK IN THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.  p.247 / And it was so for nearly four centuries ; the mechanical means of our days have a little changed the work, but the principle is always the same.

Fig. 103.—Mark of Jodocus Badius of Asch, representing the interior of a printing office about 1535. Engraving à la croix de Lorraine.

      Towards the end of the sixteenth century, a press cost about a hundred and twenty-seven crowns, with its diverse utensils, as may be seen in an unpublished / p.248 / piece analysed by Dr. Giraudet, of Tours, in a very interesting pamphlet : Une Association d'Imprimeurs et de Libraires de Paris Réfugiés à Tours au XVI^e Siècle. The workshop of Jamet Métayer, of Tours, cost a rent of eighty-three crowns—about twenty pounds of current money.
      Workmen were then paid by the "day;" and it came to be one of the expressions then so much used in manual labour, corresponding to the sum of the least work of a good workman. M. Ladevèze, printer, thought that the "day" represented the work of about twenty thousand Roman or Cicero letters employed by a compositor.
      With us the "day" of compositors and pressmen is differently calculated. The latter have to take a certain number of sheets.
      The sheet, composition and press work, cost nearly seven crowns, or nearly two pounds. Jamet Métayer paid twenty crowns for four sheets in Italics ; he demanded three months for the work.
      The primitive presses were wooden screw presses, and they so remained until the beginning of this century, when Lord Stanhope, a celebrated electrician, author, and politician, perfected them and gave his name to a new machine. His improvement consisted in that the bar was no longer fixed to the vice, but to a cylinder outside. A counter-weight brought back the platen at each blow. Pierre Didot had previously made metal platens. In 1820 the use of the Stanhope press commenced in France.
      England had, besides, taken a preponderating place in typographical invention. The printer of the Times, / PRINTING PRESSES—PAPER.  p.249 / John Walter, at the beginning of the nineteenth century, seeking to publish his journal quicker, associated himself with craftsmen who constructed mechanical presses for him. The Didots lost no time, and themselves made improvements.
      In 1848, the presses of the Constitutionnel, thanks to the application of steam, produced twenty thousand papers an hour. In our time there are machines that print only on one side, as well as double machines, printing both sides at once. The rotary machines, with endless paper, take thirty-five thousand impressions an hour. In the newspaper machines of Marinoni, the great inventor, the paper is unrolled, printed, cut, and folded without leaving the machine, and falls into a place from which it is taken ready for the subscriber. The latest perfection of the printing press is the Walter press and the rotary machine of R. Hoe and Co., of New York, extensively used throughout the world. The elaborate book has little to do with these marvellous processes, although in its turn it largely benefits by the improvement of the printing machine.
      It is apart from our purpose to speak at length on the manufacture of paper. It is certain that it was well made before the invention of printing, for most of the accounts of the fifteenth century are written on linen paper, very resisting and well sized. Later on rags were used in this manufacture ; and here, in a few words, is how paper was made in the mould, or "hand-made" before the invention of machinery for the purpose :—
      The rags, having been thoroughly cleansed, were put into vats, where they were worked up under a beating press until they were reduced to pulp. This pulp was / p.250 / thrown into hot water and stirred until the mixture was uniformly made. Then a mould of fine wire cloth, fixed upon a wooden frame, and having a "deckle" to determine the size of the sheet, was taken ; in the middle of this frame was disposed, also in brass wire, a

Fig. 104.—Paper-making. Workman engaged on the tub with the frame of wires. Engraving by Jost Amman.

factory mark, intended to appear in white in the sheet of paper, and called the "water mark." This mould was dipped into the vat of pulp and drawn out again. After gently shaking it to and fro in a horizontal position, the fibres of the pulp became so connected as to form one uniform fabric ; and the water escaped / PAPER MANUFACTURE.  p.251 / through the wires. The deckle was then removed from the mould, and the sheet of paper turned off upon a felt, in a pile with many others, a felt intervening between each sheet, and the whole subjected to great pressure, in order to absorb the superfluous water. After being dried and pressed without the felts, the sheets were dipped into a tub of size and again pressed to remove surplus size. This primitive method of paper-making is represented in fig. 104, and the same principle is still in use for the production of hand-made paper. Machinery has effected many improvements

Balance used by Jenson, at Venice.

and economies in the production of woven paper.
      China and Japan have their special paper manufacture. In Japan the material employed is the bark of the morus papifera sativa.
      According to their fineness, size, and weight, papers have received different names, proceeding from the water mark.
      Faust at Mayence used paper marked with a bull's head. Jenson at Venice used a balance of which the form varied. This latter came from a mill which furnished Vicenza, Perugia, and Rome. Jenson used, besides a crown, a cardinal's hat.
      The bull's head underwent transformations, it had stars and roses, and was special to Germany, and it may sometimes be found in Italy.
      The wires and bridges served to determine the size of a book. Looking at a folio leaf against the light, / p.252 / the wires will be seen to be horizontal, and the bridges vertical. In quarto they will be reversed, the paper having been folded in four instead of in two. The bridges become horizontal. They return to the vertical in octavo, and so on.
      As for ink, it was from the beginning a composition of lampblack and oil of different quality and nature, mixed with resin to obtain a greater and quicker dryness. Ink for engravings was more carefully made. For coloured inks various powders are mixed with the oil and resin, and a title in red and black has to go through the press twice : once for the red and once for the black.
      From the above it can be understood that illustrations in relief can easily be introduced into the composition, whether in combination with text or in separate pages. Another question presents itself : Did the old printers employ casting, or did they print directly from the wood block itself ? In other words, the block having been cut, did they make with it a mould into which melted metal could be poured to obtain a more resistant relief ? The fact is difficult to elucidate. It appears to-day that Simon Vostre, Verard, and others printed relief engravings on metal, but were they cut directly or obtained by casting, as they are now ? It cannot be determined yet.

[ p.253 ]

CHAPTER VIII.

BOOKBINDING.

The binding of the first printed books—Ancient German bindings—Binding in the time of Louis XII.—Italian bindings—Aldus—Maioli—Grolier—Francis I.—Henri II. and Diane de Poitiers—Catherine de Medicis—Henri III.—The Eves—The "fanfares"—Louis XIII.—Le Gascon—Florimond Badier—Louis XIV.—Morocco leathers—Cramoisy—The bindings of the time of Louis XIV.—The regency—Pasdeloup—The Deromes—Dubuisson—Thouvenin—Lesné—The nineteenth century—English binders—Roger Payne—Francis Bedford.

EADING the reader now towards the final perfection of the Book : printing, which had stirred up and reversed so many things, created, so to speak, the art of binding. Previously the binder was simply a workman sewing together the leaves of a manuscript, with no science or device but to clasp the whole together solidly with cord and string. As luxury increased the old binder was no longer thought of. On the wooden boards which closed the Book, jewellers encrusted their wares, lavishing ivory and precious stones to the taste of the amateur or the bookseller. Generally these works covered books of precious miniatures, the Horæ, or manuscripts that were deemed / p.254 / worthy of such magnificent clothing, rarely copies without importance. Printing at once disordered the tribe of copyists as well as the binders did jewellers. The demand increasing, rich bindings were soon abandoned, and each bookseller applied himself to the work, or at least covered in his own house books intended for sale. The fashion was not then to expose for sale, as now, unbound books. Purchasers wanted an article easy to handle, and which they were not obliged to return for ulterior embellishment.
      So to the public were presented the works laboriously composed by Gutenberg, Schoeffer, and Fust, somewhat after the manner of manuscripts, which they pretended to imitate, with their solid wooden boards covered with pig or calfskin. At the four corners, copper nails, with large heads, prevented rubbing against the shelves of the bookcase, for at that time books were ranged on their sides, and not as they are to-day. We must return to the bibliomaniac of the "Ship of Fools" to get an idea of these depositories ; before him may be seen ranged on a desk large folios, with nails on their sides, in the shelves, so defying the dust, in place of being placed upright on their edges, which rendered them liable to spots and stains. (See fig. 23.)
      Unhappily the wooden sides had in themselves a germ of destruction, the worm, capable first of reducing the sides to powder and then ravaging the body of the work, the ligatures and cords. Certain preparations destroy the insect, but the precaution often has no effect, and it is thus that the disappearance of volumes formerly so abundant, but almost impossible to find now, may be explained.

/ BOOKBINDING.  p.255 /

      From the beginning the operations of the binder were what they still are, except for improvements. They consist in the collation of the sheets of a book, folding them, beating them to bring them together and give them cohesion, and sewing them, first together, then on

Fig. 105.—Bookbinder's shop in the sixteenth century. Engraving by Jost Amman.

the cords or strings, which form the five or six bands seen on the backs. Primitively these cords were united to the wooden boards, and over both was placed a resistant skin, on which from relief or metal engravings were struck the most pleasing decorative subjects. Pigskin, white and fine, lent itself, especially among / p.256 / the Germans, to these fine editions ; and although they were issued in great number, the wooden boards have not permitted them all to exist in our time.
      The most ancient that we are able to cite are German works of the time of Louis XI. ; they are very strong and coarse. The cords in them form an enormous and massive projection. The inside of the board was often without lining of paper or stuff. In the case of fine editions a sombre velvet was sometimes used, such as Verard used to bind the books of the father of Francis I., as we have before said.
      Art did not enter into these works of preservation until about the end of the fifteenth century, with arms and emblems. At the beginning of the sixteenth century, some bindings were ornamented for Louis XII. and the Queen, Anne de Bretagne ; but not more than five or six specimens remain. They are of coarse aspect. The workman who tooled the binding here reproduced from the curious example of M. Dutuit, of Rouen, has thrown his subjects one upon another. Arms, porcupines, ermines, are treated so as to be confusing, and form a medley that is not pleasing. In recalling the delightful borders of Vostre and Pigouchet, contemporaries of this mediocre work, it is astonishing to see the degree of inferiority reached by a profession that should be inspired by graceful subjects of decoration.
      It happened that France again found in Italy masters capable of revealing secrets of composition and arrangement to enable her to strike out a new road. The Italian wars would not have had these artistic results if it had not been for the enormous sums that they swallowed up. The curious part of the enterprise was that a / JEAN GROLIER.  p.257 / war treasurer, a financier, employed by the French

Fig. 106.—Binding for Louis XII. Collection of M. Dutuit, of Rouen.

kings in these expeditions, through his relations of taste and friendship with the Alduses of Venice, brought / p.258 / to France the love of sumptuous bindings, of editions superbly clothed. He was named Jean Grolier, that bibliophile of the sixteenth century, who was, above all others, even King Francis, the first to appreciate the art of binding. It is not too much to say art, for if better had not been done before, it may safely be said that nothing better has been done since ; and the books of Grolier remain as the most perfect and most admirable types of this kind of decoration.
      Born of an Italian family established at Lyons, where most of his relatives did a great business, Jean Grolier had the good fortune to succeed his father, Stephen Grolier, treasurer of the Duke of Milan. He became in his turn Minister of Finances, and was called to accompany the kings in their expeditions in Italy. The situation of the treasurers during these campaigns was important ; they handled the pence levied with great trouble in the cities of France "for making war." Many abused their trust, and were punished, and among others the Lallemants, whom documents show us to have been in connection with Grolier, and who suffered, with Semblançay, the most terrible trials of the time.
      Italian art gave then a free course in the decoration of books. Of the interior we have spoken in our first chapters on the wood engravings ; for the exterior, the cover of the volume, foliage, golden flowers worked with a hot iron, and polychromatic compartments obtained by coloured pastes were multiplied. Thus was produced on the outside that which it was not sought to obtain on the inside, the variation of tints so select among the Italians, and so forsaken since the invention of printing. In the midst of these literary men was a / MAIOLI AND GROLIER.  p.259 / lover of books and fine connoisseur who, not content with choosing the best editions, such as those of Ferrara, Venice, and Basle, bound them superbly, with compartments of admirable tone, and had his name and device inscribed on the sides in the fashion of the time. He was named Thomas Maioli, and following the custom of the amateurs of the time, he offered the enjoyment of his library to his friends. " Tho. Maioli et amicorum," he inscribed, as did later Grolier, as also did others, but he somewhat modified the enthusiasm of his friendship by a sceptical device, " Ingratis servire nephas," which might very well be the cry of the owner of books betrayed by his borrowers.
      Maioli did not alone use these devices ; he had also a macaronic phrase of which the sense is not very clear : " Inimici mei mea michi, non me michi." He also sometimes used his monogram, which was composed of all the letters of his name.
      The relations of Grolier with this unknown and mysterious bibliophile, whose name is not always found outside his volumes, are not doubtful. Brunet possessed a volume that had belonged to Maioli and had passed through the hands of Grolier. What better proof could be wished of the communion of ideas and tastes between the two collectors ?
      But these amateurs were not alone. Beside them were princes and great lords, lay and ecclesiastic. From the commencement of the sixteenth century bookbinding had received an enormous impulse from the tastes and the predilections for these lofty fancies. And it cannot be ascribed to the simple skill of the / p.260 / workmen experimenting in that line. In the century that saw Italian artists occupied in making designs for mounted plates and painting beautiful ladies, the courtesans of Venice could not be alarmed at finding them painting models for bindings, with compartments of varied tone and style. Maioli affected white on a dark background, that is to say on a background of dark leather. He made scrolls of foliage in white or clear paste with a very happy effect.
      This was the time when Grolier travelled in Italy, in the suite of the French, and when he began his collections. He had adopted as his heraldic emblem the gooseberry bush, which in French came very near to his name — groseillier ; and his motto was " Nec herba nec arbor" (" Neither tree nor herb"), explicative of the moderation of his wealth. He was soon in connection with the Alduses, and through them with the principal learned men and binders of the time, for it was not in the offices of the Manutiuses that could be found workmen, like those of the Chamber of Accounts in France, obliged to swear that they did not know how to read. The master was not hindered by details of difference of language, and it followed that his workmen understood Greek and Latin, for he often gave them instruction in those languages. How far off these erudite and conscientious workmen appear to-day !
      Following the fashion, Grolier put his name on the upper side of his books—" Jo. Grolierii et amicorum"—in gold letters, and on the other side a pious motto, the sense of which was a hope often uttered by the financiers of the sixteenth century, imprisoned and hung every instant : " Portio mea, Domine, sit in terra / GROLIER'S BINDINGS.  p.261 / viventium." Generally all the Grolier books which came from the Alduses have the name on the upper side and the motto on the other side ; the title was placed above the name, and often disposed in rows. Some large volumes had the cover ornamented with an architectural design, like the Jamblichus of the Libri collection, which had on the front the façade of a temple, with the title in rows on the door. This volume was printed by Aldus in 1516, and probably decorated by him for the account of the great French amateur.
      Jean Grolier is said to have himself designed some of the subjects of his ornaments, and their perfection indicates an active and enlightened supervision. On his return to France, where he had a house near the Porte de Bucy, he was put in relation with Geoffroy Tory, the artist best fitted to understand him, and who was at once painter, engraver, printer, and binder. It was there that, in the leisure of his financial functions, between two projects of revictualling the forts of Outre Seine and Yonne, Grolier invented combinations, sought interlacings, and laid out foliage. Tory himself teaches us these works in combination. He invented antique letters for Grolier, he tells us in his Champfleury. It was for him, too, that he interwove so finely his compartments for binding, and that he reproduced the delightful ornaments of his books of hours in golden scrolls.
      As we have said, Grolier placed his titles on the sides of his books on account of the arrangement of the works on the shelves of the library where they were laid. For this reason also the back was neglected, and no ornament used upon it ; thick and heavy with its / p.262 / projecting bands, without decoration between the bands, this part of the bound volume was a kind of waste in a splendidly cultivated garden. The profusion of books brought about a revolution. There was no longer room to place on their sides the innumerable books that were produced ; they were then placed on their edges, as now, and the back also was decorated. For this the bands were made to disappear, and replaced by decorative subjects in compartments like the sides. Then with Grolier the bands reappeared, and the title was placed between them, as it still is.
      The books of Grolier have been divided, according to their production, in four or five principal classes, in which they may always be placed. First were the works ornamented in compartments, gilt, with scrolls in full gold ; then the same with the scrolls azurés, that is to say equally gilt, but having parallel lines like the azure of heraldry. Following comes the school of Geoffroy Tory, with gilt compartments in the style of the great French decorator ; last the polychromatic bindings, in which, by the aid of colour or mastic, the alternating tones are mixed. Grolier also had some mosaic bindings, composed of little pieces of leather connected by incrustation or paste, pure Italian bindings ; but these were not numerous, especially if compared with those conceived in the manner of Geoffroy Tory.
      One of these latter works is here reproduced from one of the beautiful books in the collection of M. Dutuit. This copy has the back flat, and the interlacings of the decoration are most complicated and clever.
      Grolier got his Levant moroccos through the dealers

[ p.263 ]

Fig. 107.—Binding for Grolier in the collection of M. Dutuit.

/ p.264 /

of Venice, to make sure of the material he employed.
      Born in 1479, the Treasurer-general of Outre Seine lived until 1565. In 1563 an original manuscript shows him much occupied with finance at over eighty-four years of age ; but his passion for bindings had cooled down, for few books signed with his name are found the manufacture of which could descend to the son of Henri II. After great trials, after having seen Semblançay suffer at Montfaucon, John Lallemand beheaded, and himself having come nearly to losing life and fortune at one blow, Grolier passed away quietly in his house, having collected most of the fine books of the time and many curious medals. Christopher de Thou, his friend and confrère in the love of books, had saved his reputation before the Parliament of Paris. After his death his library was transported to the Hotel de Vic, and from there dispersed in 1675, a hundred years after.
      Thus from Italian art came French binding, still remaining original. The kings did not fail to follow the movement, and even to anticipate it, thanks to the means at their disposal. We have seen Francis I. at work with the energy of an artisan at least ; but Geoffroy Tory was his principal inspirer, and who knows but that he was the chief operative for the prince, as for the great financier ?
      We have said that Louis XII. knew nothing of fine bindings. During his travels in Italy he had received presentation copies of magnificently covered books, and among others that of Faustus Andrelinus, that was bound in calf in honour of the King. He, who was so little expert in fine arts, purchased the entire library of

[ p.265 ]

Fig. 108.—Binding for Francis I., with the arms of France and the salamander.

/ p.266 /

the Sire de la Gruthuse, and substituted his own emblems for those of the high and mighty lord. Francis I., with innate sentiment for masterpieces and the powerful protection he had given them, did not allow the experi-

Fig. 109.—Mark of Guyot Marchant, printer and bookbinder. He published the Danse Macabre of 1485.

ments of Grolier to pass unnoticed. The King did not desire to be behind the treasurer, and the workmen were put to the task. He adopted the salamander, which emblem he used on his castles and furniture

[ p.267 ]

Fig. 110.—Binding for Henri II., with the "H" and crescents.

/ p.268 /

and the liveries of his people ; he lavished it also on the sides of his books. On the side the "F" is often seen crowned, then the emblem of France and the collar of St. Michael. In the binding of which a facsimile is here given, Geoffroy Tory has singularly inspired the gilder, if he did not himself make the design. For it must not be thought that this work is done at a single blow by means of an engraved plate or a block. On the contrary, every line is impressed by the hot tool that the workman applies by hand to the gold laid on in advance, making it, so to speak, enter into the skin or morocco. There is the art ; blocks serve only for commercial bindings, quickly impressed and intended for ordinary purchasers.
      Under the reign of Francis I. the binders were the booksellers, as Verard and Vostre were. The King was ordinarily served by a publisher named Pierre Roffet, and he frequently figures in accounts that have been preserved. Roffet not only bound, but it appears that he rebound books to patterns which the King desired. Philip Lenoir and Guyot Marchant were also royal workmen. The latter, whose mark is here reproduced, frequently added to it the saints Crispin and Crispinian, patrons of the leather-dressers, who prepared the leather for the binder.
      The discoveries of Grolier did not allow the binders much time to be idle. Thousands of volumes were then destroyed to make the boards for sides. From this many discoveries are made in our days by pulling to pieces sixteenth century work, unknown playing cards, and early printed works. To mention only one example, twenty leaves of the "Perspective" of Viator

[ p.269 ]

Fig. 111.—Binding for Henri II. (Mazarine Library).

/ p.270 /

were discovered in the National Library of Paris. The board thus formed was covered indifferently with sheepskin, parchment, calf, morocco, or goatskin ; the books were sewn on raised or sunk bands, according to the owner's taste ; the edges were gilt, sometimes gauffered, and designs often impressed upon them to match those of the sides. In large folios wooden boards were still used, more solid, and protected from rubbing by nails in relief. But the inside of the cover was as yet only covered with paper. Leather linings were very uncommon.
      The reign of Henri II. increased yet more the importance of bindings ; it was the time when Grolier collected, and clever artists came from all parts. Geoffroy Tory had given the best models for letters and interlacings. The Queen, Catherine, derived from her parents the taste for decoration in gold and colours, and patronised the artists called by her from the court of Florence ; and the favourite, Diane de Poitiers, Duchess of Valentinois, rivalled her in luxury and expenditure. Henri II. in the decoration of his castles, as well as his books, introduced equivocal emblems, of which the signification may be doubtful, but those of his mistress may be recognised, not those of the legitimate Queen. He interlaced two reversed "D's" by an " H," in the form shown in the border on the preceding page. Strictly speaking, we ought to see there two "C's" back to back ; but as we find the "D" on all the bindings displaying the arms of Diana, there can be no doubt, and Queen Catherine doubted less than anybody. Other emblems of Diana are to be found in the arcs and crescents that are plentifully displayed. The library of Diana was / BINDINGS OF HENRI II.  p.271 / large, owing to the King not hesitating to take valuable

Fig. 112.—Italian binding for Catherine de Medicis, with the initials " C.C."

books from the public collections for her. Two centuries after her death it was dispersed, and the greater part of / p.272 / the books belonging to the national collections were restored on the deaths of those who then purchased them. Hence the largest number of the bindings of Henri II. and Diana of Poitiers will be found in the National Library of Paris.
      Queen Catherine also had special patterns with a monogram identical with the double "D" mentioned above, but the branches of the "C" were a little longer than the branches of the "H ;" she also used a "K" on the sides of her books. The specimen which we reproduce is a purely Italian work.
      From kings and queens the fashion passed to the great lords, it having come to the kings and queens from a private individual. The Constable Anne de Montmorency adorned his bindings with a cross and spread eagle. Among the amateurs of binding of the sixteenth, seventeenth, and eighteenth centuries using distinctive marks, we may mention Philip Desportes, the poet, who used two Φ enlaced, as did also Superintendent Fouquet in the seventeenth century. The brothers Dupuy adopted the double Δ, arranged as a star. Colbert had a curled snake (coluber for Colbert !), the Gondis two masses of arms, Madame de Pompadour three towers, etc. Fouquet beside the Φ used a squirrel on some of his bindings.
      In Germany, Count Mansfeldt adopted the ornamental style with arms, of which a specimen is here given ; and Marc Laurin de Watervliet also decorated and dedicated his books to his friends, using the motto " Virtus in arduo." Among the lords of the French courts who favoured polychromatic ornament and bold compositions were the young Valois, Louis de Sainte

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Fig. 113.—Binding with the arms of Mansfeldt, with azure scroll work, from the Didot collection.

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Maure, Marquis of Nesle, and Henri de Guise, called "Le balafré."
      Charles IX. had his emblems and devices, the double "C" crowned the legend "Pietate et justitia," but his brother, Henri III., loved the decoration of books more than he did. The passion of the King for miniatures which he cut out of books is known ; this passion for golden things he repeated on bindings, for which he chose special designs. Henri III. was an amateur of dances of death ; he visited cemeteries, attended funerals, and took a death's-head for his emblem. This emblem was not his invention ; long before him Marot had addressed an epigram to a lady in which he brought love and death into close conjunction. However that may be, the King chose skeletons and penitents' tears to ornament his books. He also tolerated diamonds, although he absolutely prohibited them in the clothing of ladies or fixed the number pro rata with the rank of the authorised person. There was in this prince a singular mixture of taste and artistic acuteness by the side of a mania or hallucination which was reflected on the most intimate objects of his apparel or of his furniture. Thus if we find, at the end of the sixteenth century, a death's-head on the sides or the back of a volume, the binding is of the period of Henri III.
      The binders of his time are known by the mention that is made of them in the royal accounts ; the Eves were the most celebrated among all of them. Nicholas Eve was charged with the binding of the Statutes of the Order of St. Esprit, with which the King gratified his friends. Mention of this work is found in the Clairambault manuscripts, where we read, "To Nicholas Eve,

[ p.275 ]

Fig. 114.—Sixteenth century binding, called à la fanfare. In the Dutuit collection.

/ p.276 /

washer and binder of books and bookseller to the King, forty-seven and a half escus for washing, gilding, and squaring the edges of forty-two books of statutes and ordinances of the Order, bound and covered with orange Levant morocco, enriched on one side with the arms of the King, fully gilt, and on the other of France and Poland, with monograms at the four corners, and the rest flames, with orange and blue ribbons," etc.
      Louise de Lorraine, wife of Henri III., counted for little in the life of her husband ; nevertheless she had a certain number of books decorated with their united escutcheons.
      The bindings attributed to Eve were decorated all over the sides and back with interlacing patterns of geometrical character, the spaces between the parallel lines and in the middle of the figures left at first quite blank, but afterwards filled in with palm branches and wreaths of foliage ; to these delicate and elaborate yet brilliant toolings have been given the name of bindings à la fanfare. This designation requires explanation, and is a good example of the grotesque style adopted by modern amateurs in their appellations.
      The fine work of that time prepared for the coming in the seventeenth century—about 1620—of the works of Le Gascon, or at least for the artist with whom in our days are connected the works of the reign of Louis XIII. Under Henri IV. the fleur-de-lys occupied most of the covers of the royal books, from vellum to Levant morocco ; works in this class had nothing very remarkable. The first years of Louis XIII. revealed a new process, inspired by the Eves. Le Gascon embroidered delightfully on the fanfare ornaments;

[ p.277 ]

Fig. 115. — Le Gascon binding.

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showing the fibres of the leaves, he made a new kind of ornament, consisting of minute gold dots elaborated into lines and curves of singular brilliancy and elegance. Of this style, called pointillé, we give a specimen from the collection of M. Dutuit. The fashion had arrived all at once ; lace, banished from clothing by severe edicts, found a refuge on the covering of books.
      The times were hard then for binders ; they were constrained to live in the university and to employ only its workmen. A binder was never his own gilder ; he employed the gaufreurs of shoe-leather, more expert and bolder, to gild his leather. Among these artisans was one named Pigorreau, whom the edict found living in the midst of publishers and working for them ; he was compelled to choose either to remain bootmaker or become bookseller ; he chose the latter, against the syndics of the trade, against every one, and he made enemies for himself. He revenged himself by turning the masters into ridicule in a placard.
      Le Gascon was probably the assumed name of an artist in this style. The Guirlande de Julie, worked by him for Mademoiselle de Rambouillet, gave him great honour in the special circle of this little literary court. It was the fashion then for poor authors to put a fine covering on their works and to offer them to the great for their own profit. Tallement des Reaux notably signalises the poet Laserre, who displayed his luxury in irreproachable bindings. And then the farmers of the revenue, successors of Grolier in financial trusts, formed libraries for pure fashion, never opening the volumes covered for them in sumptuous attire. If we may believe Sauval, author of the

/ LE GASCON BINDINGS.  p.279 /

Fig. 116. — Le Gascon binding for Cardinal Mazarin.

Antiquités de Paris, they went further, and on covers without books inscribed imaginary titles and fantastic / p.280 / squibs to mislead their visitors. The bookcase being carefully closed, it was difficult to discover the imposition. Sauval writes, "In place of books, they are content with covers of levant morocco, on the backs of which, in gold letters, are inscribed the names of the most celebrated authors. A binder of the university assured me that not long since he and his confrères had made them for a single financier to the amount of 10,000 crowns !"
      The works of Le Gascon will be found more among great personages than with the so-called collectors, which gives value to their grace and charm. The King's brother Gaston possessed them, then Mazarin, an example from whose library is here reproduced. On this binding Le Gascon worked gilt compartments and elaborate arabesques ; in the middle of the sides are the arms of the Cardinal and his pretentious device : "Arma Julii ornant Franciam !"—"The arms of Jules the ornament of France !" In spite of the profusion of subjects, nothing could better please the eye or indicate a man of taste.
      But if Le Gascon be a legendary personage, he had an imitator or rival, very near to him, named Florimond Badier, whose works had at least the advantage of being signed. At the bottom of the inside cover of an inlaid morocco binding in the National Library at Paris is the inscription " Florimond Badier fec., inv." The analogy between this work and those known as Le Gascon's is palpable ; inside and outside, the cover is stippled with small tools (au petit fer ) in the same manner. Florimond Badier was not appointed bookseller until 1645, and so could not have composed / BINDINGS FOR LOUIS XIV.  p.281 / earlier bindings attributed to Le Gascon, but this resemblance of style evidences the existence of a Parisian school, the adepts of which copied one another, as they do nowadays.
      The work was soon simplified ; pallets and wheel-shaped tools were invented to produce that which was improperly called dentelle ; this mechanical work was done by a wheel-shaped tool, previously heated, on gold in sized leaves, on which it impressed its projections.
      With Louis XIV. the passion for gilding increased. Charming festoons were designed, but they were soon abused, and inundated the libraries. On the sides were seen rising suns, arms, and golden garlands. Cramoisy directed the royal bindings, the King having devoted large sums to the purchase of Levant leathers. In 1666 the Director of Works ordered red moroccos ; in 1667 he received twenty-two dozen skins, amounting, with the expenses of transport, to 1,020 livres tournois. Successive supplies were made, and were used for the royal library, sixty-nine dozen in 1667, forty-six dozen in 1668, and three hundred and thirty-three dozen in 1670, costing the King more than 12,000 livres. On these admirably dressed skins, which, in spite of incessant use, still remain now as in their first days, the King caused to be applied, according to the size, tools of borders, having in the middle the arms of France, with the collar of St. Esprit.
      Among the binders mentioned in the very useful work of M. J. J. Guiffrey on the expenditure of Louis XIV., we find Gilles Dubois, who died before 1670 ; Levasseur, binder of Huet, Bishop of Avranches ; La Tour, Mérins or Mérius, who died before 1676 ; and also / p.282 / Ruette, the reputed inventor of marbled paper for fly-leaves of books : to him the bindings of the Chancellor de Séguier, with their ornament of the golden fleece, and of Madame de Séguier, are attributed. It was probably these men who decorated the books of the brothers Dupuy, Fouquet, and Colbert, marvellous works of solidity, if not always of elegance, which have resisted all assaults. Unhappily, in many instances the mechanical dentelle overburdened the work, and gave it a commonplace regularity. In the Condé, Colbert, and perhaps even Madame de Longueville's collections, there are many specimens of this kind with two or three filleted borders.
      We have come to an epoch when the difficulties resulting from confusion between the booksellers' and binders' trades began to be understood. The revocation of the Edict of Nantes had implicitly prepared a crowd of measures and rules in all branches of national industry. It was a good occasion to prevent the artisans of binding unduly parading themselves as booksellers and selling merchandise of which they understood nothing ; Louis XIV. interfered, and separated the two communities. The binders then became the relieurs-doreurs of books ; they had their own organisation, but remained subject to the university ; the heads of the fraternity were called the " guards." The principal arrangements of the regulation of 1749 were : the members of the corporation had the sole right to bind books, from the elegant volume to registers of blank paper. Five years of apprenticeship and three of companionship were necessary to obtain the brevet of freedom and to hold a shop. Moreover, it was

[ p.283 ]

Fig 117. — Mosaic binding of the eighteenth century for the Spaccio de la Bestia Trionfante.

/ p.284 /

indispensable to read and write. One regulation ordained that the workman should be "able to bind and ornament ordinary books or others, to render them perfect and entire, to sew the sheets at most two together with thread and real bands, with joints of parchment, and not paper, and in case of infraction the said books were to be remade at the expense of the offender, who was besides condemned to a penalty of thirty livres for each volume." Their establishment was confined to the quarter from the Rue St. André des Arts to the Place Maubert ; they regulated the sale of calfskin and of tools ; in a word, they were surrounded by precautions by which the production remained always under the supervision of the masters and completely satisfied the client. This calculating policy was, in fact, a close imitation of the royal ordinance of 1686.
      The mosaic bindings used from the end of the reign of Louis XIV. were an application of pared leathers of colours different from the background, pasted on to the side. The binders of the regency composed a great number, attributed now to Pasdeloup, as all the crayons of the sixteenth century are called Clouets, and all the panels on wood Holbeins. It is not that there was great originality in these works, or a particular art ; more often the workman did no more than transcribe Le Gascon or Eve or the older binders, and accommodated the processes of these artists to the fashion of his time. In this style we may cite the Spaccio de la Bestia Trionfante, printed at Paris 1584, for which the binder designed a cover of doubtful taste and, above all, an undeniable want of proportion. The

[ p.285 ]

Fig. 118.—Mosaic binding of the eighteenth century, with the arms of the Regent. M. Morgand's collection.

/ p.286 /

tendency was then to flowers occupying three-fourths of the page, to compartments too large, to open pomegranates, like the Spaccio here reproduced. If Pasdeloup had discovered these mediocre combinations, he could not be proclaimed the regenerator of a fallen art. The bastard style of these works may be compared to their mosaics, constructed of pieces ; it is a little of everything, and together it is nothing. However, in the midst of the quantity of mediocre things, some pleasing decoration is from time to time met with ; the design of a volume with the arms of the Regent and his wife, Mademoiselle de Blois, wants neither elegance nor taste ; without being perfection, it has better proportion and balance.
      We should, however, hesitate to give names to all these works. Besides Pasdeloup, there were the Deromes, abandoning a little the mosaics, devising flowers and dentelles in combination, and no longer the simple products of the fillet. They formed a dynasty ; and if the Pasdeloups were at least twelve, there were fourteen Deromes all booksellers and binders from the reign of Louis XIV. The most celebrated was James Anthony, who died in 1761.
      Peter Paul Dubuisson was not only a binder ; he was a designer. He invented heraldic ornaments, and composed models of gilding tools, in which his contemporaries emulated him. He was intimate with the delicate vignettist Eisen, and the counsels of an artist of this value could not but be useful to him. It is an extraordinary thing that in this world of celebrated printers, amateur financiers, and notable painters and engravers, not a single man can be met to give a real / DEROME AND HIS SUCCESSORS.  p.287 / impulse to the art of which we speak, and to prevent the dull continuance of experiments on the whole so poor. Doubtless the dentelles of Derome had a certain air of gaiety, to which the books of the eighteenth century accommodated themselves perfectly ; the tools of Dubuisson produce most pleasing designs ; but the old, the great binders, had altogether disappeared.
      Besides, Derome massacred without pity the rarest works. He loved edges very regularly cut, and he did not fail to hew down margins opposed to his taste. He sawed books as well ; that is to say, in place of sewing the sheets on to projecting bands, he made a groove in the back, in which the cord was embedded. The books have no resistance.
      To these celebrated names of French binders of the eighteenth century we may add Le Monnier, who worked for the Orleans princes ; Tessier, his successor ; Laferté, who decorated the small volumes of the Duc de la Vallière as Chamot covered the large ones ; in 1766 Chamot was royal binder. There was also Pierre Engerrand, then Biziaux, an original, who worked for Madame de Pompadour and Beaumarchais. Boyet, or Boyer, worked (1670–80) in the style of Le Gascon, with the same minute tooling, but simpler in character. Duseuil put very elaborate and delicate tooling on his covers from about 1710 to 1720.
      The Revolution effaced many of the fine works which displayed the symbols "of a royalty justly detested," and Mercier wrote certain wicked little poems against binding. Lesné was the poet of book-binding, and he invented the process of plain calf without boards. Certainly from Grolier to Lesné there / p.288 / were numerous changes, so numerous that, in spite of the nude calf, it may be said that the art was nearly dead. In our days it has a little recovered. Amateurs have found new names, and often artists, to patronise : Trautz-Bauzonnet, Capé, Duru, Lortic, Marius Michel, in France ; Bedford, Rivière, Zaehnsdorf, Pratt, in England ; Matthews, Bradstreet, Smith, in the United States ; and many others. Unhappily, fortune does not permit every one to furnish his library luxuriously ; the true connoisseur searches rather for Groliers, Eves, and Le Gascons, than concerns himself about modern workmanship. Whatever may be its value, it is only fit to clothe the works of the time. A book published by Lemerre and bound by Petit is in true character, but a fifteenth or sixteenth century book passed under the hands of Trautz-Bauzonnet himself will be very much like an ancient enamel in a modern frame newly gilt.
      Bookbinding in England has, with very few exceptions, never attained the artistic excellence reached in France. From the earliest times to the present day servile imitations of foreign work only are seen. The one purely original English binder is Roger Payne, who from about 1770 worked for thirty or forty years in London, performing with his own hands every stage of the work, even to cutting his own tools. The result was good, solid work, with perfectly original and often very beautiful decoration, appropriate to the character of the work itself. His favourite style was drooping lines of leaf ornaments in the borders and geometrical patterns in small tools. After him came Charles Lewis, who was an artist in the true sense of the word, and, coming down to our own time, Francis Bedford, who, / BINDING FOR THE TRADE.  p.289 / never pretending to originality, copied the best designs of the old French and Italian binders. His full calf books, with handsomely tooled backs, are models of solidity and taste ; and his decorations on the sides of morocco-bound books are always in good taste, and often of great elegance. The binders of the present day, perhaps for lack of patronage, seem to have abandoned originality ; and although much excellent work is done, it is no more than a copy of the Eves, Le Gascon, Derome, and the older artists.
      Parallel with the luxurious bindings with which we have been exclusively occupied, there has always been the commercial work, prepared in advance. Liturgical works, above all, are sold in this form. Books intended for Grolier or other grand personages had their covers decorated au petit fer, and presented the result of the manual labour of skilled artists ; but for these a pattern was engraved in relief, leaving nothing to the caprice of the artist, and it was mechanically impressed on the side. This process is termed blocking. It was principally used in Germany, but Vostre, Verard, and Tory employed the same means. Even the interlacings and the capricious arabesques of Grolier were imitated by means of a fixed plate, parts of which were finished by hand to make it appear a complete work of imagination and handicraft. *

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CHAPTER IX.

LIBRARIES.

RT, science, and literature took refuge in convents before the invention of Printing, and libraries did not count many books. According to daily wants, the monastery scribes copied the treatises lent by neighbouring houses, and the collection was thus painfully made during many centuries. Two or three hundred works constituted ordinary collections ; the powerful abbeys found in their staff the means of enriching their libraries, as we have said, but they were the privileged ones.
      Excepting kings and some princes, few people possessed a library. The great expense of transcription, the want of facility for procuring originals, and the enormous price of manuscripts left no hope to bibliophiles of moderate fortune. Typography, on the contrary, having multiplied books and put at relatively modest prices reproductions formerly inaccessible, private collections commenced. We have had occasion to speak before of Grolier and Maioli ; they were the most illustrious, but not the only ones.
      At first a public library was an unknown thing. The richest and the most easily got together, that of / FRENCH ROYAL LIBRARIES.  p.291 / the King of France, was private. Since John the Good in France the acquisitions were numerous, and Gutenberg's invention contributed to augment the stock of volumes everywhere. Charles VIII. and Louis XII. found or took in their expeditions in Italy, and were able to add to the original nucleus, many rare editions, especially from the Sforzas at Pavia, who had marvels without number. Brought together at Blois, under the care of John de Labarre, the royal library did not yet occupy a very large space, in spite of its increase. Under Charles V. the number of books was about a thousand ; about 1500 or 1510 they were nearly doubled, and the printed books did not number more than two hundred.
      So restricted, the royal library travelled with the other treasures of the Crown ; Francis I. transported it from Blois to Fontainebleau, and even parts of it to the Italian wars, as related above. In its new quarters the royal collection, in spite of the successive accessions of the books of John d'Angoulême, grandfather of the King, and of those of the dukes of Orleans, counted but 1,781 manuscripts and a hundred and nine printed books on the shelves. The King, ambitious in literature no less than in arts, nominated an illustrious savant, Guillaume Budé, to the office of master of his library ; and this qualification was maintained by his successors until the fall of the royal power.
      With Budé commenced the system of continuous acquisitions. The treasury was liberally opened to vendors of rarities. At this time the books, placed upon their sides, one upon another, gave no idea of a modern library, with its volumes ranged on end, / p.292 / having their titles between the bands of the back. In speaking of Grolier, we remarked that the sides of a binding alone had importance on account of their place on the shelves ; it was the same with Francis I.
      Under Henri II. the Fontainebleau collection was somewhat pillaged for Diana of Poitiers, but, as a corrective for this dilapidation, the King adopted a measure, since preserved, which substituted for acquisitions a regular and uninterrupted supply ; this was the contribution by publishers to the library of one bound copy on vellum of all the works printed under privilege. The ordinance was made in 1556 ; the successors of Henri II. had only this means of increasing the number of their volumes, with the exception that Charles IX. expended a large sum in the purchase of Grolier's collection of medals.
      Such was the working of the royal library for about a half-century, but the idea of making it public had not come. Diffused as was then the passion for books, it had not yet been democratised to the point of being understood by the people. Amateurs and lovers of reading formed special collections in their houses, at times rivalling that of the King. Then the fashion was no more to lay the books on their sides, but they were now ranged to allow room for new acquisitions. Henri IV., who had not his great-uncle's predilection for Fontainebleau, commanded the removal to Paris of the books buried in the castle. He added to them those of Catherine de Medicis coming from Marshal Strozzi ; and as the college of Clermont had become vacant by the dispersion of the Jesuits, he lodged the library in 1599 in one of the rooms of that establish- / THE FRENCH ROYAL LIBRARY.  p.293 / ment, under the care of James Augustus de Thou, master of the library.
      We now see the royal collection brought to Paris, which it has never quitted ; but before its definitive installation, before it was made public, it passed through a century, during which additions were made, purchases increased, and the number of manuscripts and printed books augmented in enormous proportions. Henri IV. desired to place it near the court, to avoid pillage and to have the chief librarian near to him. The return of the Jesuits in 1604 upset the first establishment a little ; the college of Clermont was evacuated ; the books were transported to the Cordeliers and distributed in rooms on the ground and first floors, whence the names of upper and lower libraries. There was a mass of volumes very little used, for the public did not enjoy them, and the King held them as his own ; but the time was near when the collection was to take a very serious step under the influence of the brothers Dupuy in 1645, and afterwards of Jerome Bignon. Always shut up in the incommodious chambers of the Cordeliers, the library contained 5,259 volumes, manuscript and printed, perhaps less than some private libraries ; after the Dupuys it had at least 10,329 printed books.
      Mazarin was the first to comprehend the natural use of collections of books : publicity. His private library, placed before 1651 in his magnificent house in the Rue Richelieu, where later was definitively lodged the royal library, was opened to readers every Tuesday, from eight to eleven and two to five. Dispersed in 1651, at the fall of the Cardinal, it was later / p.294 / reconstituted, and in less than ten years afterwards the former minister was able to open it in its new quarters, the College of the Four Nations, where it is still.
      While the Mazarin library was administering liberally to the wants of the public, that of the King remained closely shut up in the rooms of the Cordeliers. Colbert, influenced by this state of things, offered two houses in the Rue Vivienne to the King, where the books could find a more convenient lodging, and allow room for increase. The removal was made in 1666. The royal collection for fifty-five years was lodged only a few steps from its final resting-place, the Hotel de Nevers. So was called at the end of the seventeenth century the splendid mansion of Mazarin, situated near the Porte de Richelieu, in the street of the same name, whence his books had been previously torn and sold to all the dealers. Divided into two parts at the death of the Cardinal in 1661, the palace fell, one part to the Duc de Mazarin, the other to the Duc de Nevers, his nephews. At first the King dreamed, under the advice of Louvais, of acquiring the land in the neighbourhood of the Rue Vivienne and of elevating a monument for his library, for the thought of putting the Hotel de Nevers to this use had not then occurred to him ; but the Duc de Mazarin having alienated his part of the palace in favour of the Company of the Indies, Abbé Bignon, then royal librarian, perceived the part he could play from that fact.
      Thanks to the administration of Colbert and the liberalities of the King, the collection had been augmented threefold. At the time of the removal to the Rue Vivienne, Nicolas Clément worked at the classi- / THE FRENCH ROYAL LIBRARY.  p.295 / fying and cataloguing of 35,000 volumes. He distributed them into methodical classes, and devoted nine years—1675 to 1684—to his work. But this first unravelling was soon insufficient. Less than four years after, he commenced a new inventory in twenty-one volumes, which occupied thirty years, having been finished in the course of March, 1714. This time the numbers amounted to 43,000 printed volumes ; his twenty-three principal divisions, containing all the letters of the alphabet, are very nearly preserved up to our day. In 1697 the question of publishing this enormous work was agitated, and on this point Clément had a curious correspondence with a learned Dane named Frederick Bostgaard ; he also, in a celebrated pamphlet, Idée d'une Nouvelle Manière de dresser le Catalogue d'une Bibliothèque, indicated practical observations ; he resolved this arduous question for important collections by difference of sizes ; but his project was not executed, although favoured from the first by Abbé Bignon.
      As the collection was not available for workers, the work of Clément had only a relative importance. A councillor of the Prince of Waldeck, a German of the name of Nemeitz, who travelled in France in the beginning of the eighteenth century, having seen it in the houses of the Rue Vivienne, says that the library occupied then twenty-six rooms and contained 75,000 volumes in all ; it was shown voluntarily to strangers, but not to the public. Nemeitz gives some other curious particulars as to the libraries of Paris (Séjour à Paris : Leyde, 1727, 8vo).
      The bank of Law, that had been lodged for some time in the Hotel de Nevers, alienated by the heirs of / p.296 / Mazarin, soon disappeared with the ruin of his system. As we have said above, Bignon appreciated the importance of the neglected palace for commodiously lodging the royal collections. This was in 1721. The collection was about to be subdivided into four sections, or, as they were then called in the administrative style, four distinct departments : manuscripts, printed books, titles, and engraved plates. The master of the library pressed the Regent to profit by the occasion, to which he agreed. In the month of September the removal commenced, and from the Rue Vivienne, the royal library, the first in the world and the most valuable, as Naudé says, entered the former palace of the Cardinal, which it was never to quit again.
      We approach the epoch when this great scientific establishment was to quit its private character and to open its doors to the learned of all countries. In 1735 it was decided to print the catalogue of some divisions only : theology, canonical law, public law, and belles lettres. This resolution coincided precisely with the opening of the doors which took place in 1737, in which year appeared the first volume of the catalogue comprising the sacred Scriptures. At the end of the eighteenth century the royal library was finally established ; the printed books then comprised about 200,000 volumes, and access was had by a staircase leading to six grand saloons, which were surrounded by galleries. From this moment the rooms became too small. At the Revolution the number of books had increased to 300,000, and projects of enlargement commenced, to be continued to our time ; but, in spite of these proposals, the surface occupied by the library has remained / FRENCH PUBLIC LIBRARIES.  p.297 / the same since the time of Louis XV. Enlargements and alterations have been made year after year on the same ground without much new construction. But how the treasures have been augmented to this time ! If the printed books at the Revolution represented a little more than 300,000 volumes, to-day they exceed two millions ; the prints number two and a half millions ; the medals, 100,000 ; the manuscripts, something over 90,000.
      If we have thus brought the summary history of the National Library of Paris to our days, it was to avoid mixing it with other matters. We have entered into such detail regarding it as is fitting for the most important library in the world. We now return to the seventeenth century.
      At the time when Henri IV. carried from Fontainebleau to Paris the nucleus of volumes that was to have so brilliant a destiny, the passion for books had singularly spread itself in France. We have already spoken of Mazarin ; after him Cardinal Richelieu designed to open his private collection to the public, and in his will he manifested his clearly held intention. He went further in his last wishes : he prescribed the daily sweeping and dusting of the precious collection, and its augmentation by a thousand livres tournois each year. The great personages of the time were not behind ; and Sauval says that in the seventeenth century there were 1,000 or 1,200 private libraries in Paris, numbering 1,700,000 volumes.
      In the provinces there were few public libraries. The communities and learned Societies, the Jesuits and other religious houses, and the universities had collect- / p.298 / tions. At Orleans a library was opened for Germans, and the students of that country were able to work at their ease under the supervision of two librarians.
      At the end of the eighteenth century the number of libraries had increased in large proportions ; the amateurs had made their influence felt. The Book was not sought only for what it contained, but also for its exterior clothing. Only the great libraries open to everybody remained eclectic, and provided a little of everything. Besides the royal library, there were in Paris a great number of other collections, which the revolutionary storm upset and often destroyed. That of St. Germain des Près was burnt in 1794. That of St. Geneviève, founded in 1625, had benefited by celebrated donations, among others those of the cardinals De Berulle and De la Rochefoucauld ; the Arsenal, created by the Marquis de Paulmy, was successively enriched by important acquisitions, among which was the collection of the Duc de la Vallière. These collections still exist, and are open to the public, as also are the National Library, the Mazarine, the Sorbonne, the Museum, the School of Fine Arts, the City of Paris, the Institute, the Louvre, and the several scientific faculties.
      The provinces have not been behind in the movement. Many of the great cities contain a considerable number of books easily accessible, among them the libraries of Bordeaux and Rouen, amounting to 150,000 volumes ; Troyes and Besançon, 100,000, etc. Few important centres have less than 20,000. These collections have been generally composed of those of the religious establishments, closed by the Revolution.

/ PUBLIC LIBRARIES IN GERMANY.  p.299 /

      In our time public libraries are augmented by the legal deposit, gifts of the State, legacies of private persons, and purchases. The legal deposit in France relates almost exclusively to the National Library, and proceeds from the measures taken by Henri II. in 1556. Each French printer has now to deposit a certain number of copies of the works that he issues, and these volumes go to swell the number of books in the Rue de Richelieu. At the rate of 30,000 a year, the time is easily anticipated and very near when the space will be found insufficient. Some measures will have to be taken.
      Germany, the cradle of printing, was not favoured in the beginning. It had, however, in the seventeenth century, in Wolfenbüttel, a little town in the duchy of Brunswick, a curious collection of books, in a detached building, of which the engraver Merian has preserved for us the physiognomy ; it contained nearly 200,000 volumes, an enormous number for the time. The rather low rooms were shelved all round ; in the middle were cases of the height of a man, also filled with books ; the readers helped themselves, and were seated for working. The exterior of the building, without being sumptuous, was isolated and detached. In our time this collection includes the Bible, glass, and inkstand of Luther and his portrait by Lucas Cranach.
      Another curious library, dating from the beginning of the seventeenth century, is that of the city of Leyden. An engraving by Woudan shows its state in 1610, with its classifications and divisions. The books were ranged in cases provided with breast-high desks. The books were placed with the edges in front, and / p.300 / not as now, and were so attached that they could only be consulted in their place. Each body of shelving contained a series of authors : theology, philosophy, mathematics, history, medicine, law, and literature. The room, of square shape, was lighted by windows right and left. Between the bays were portraits, views of cities, and maps. On the right, in a shrine, was enclosed the legacy of Joseph Scaliger. Communication was less liberal than at Wolfenbüttel; the readers were obliged to take the books from the shelves themselves and read them standing before the desks.
      In England, the celebrated Oxford Library should be mentioned, augmented and restored in 1597 by Sir Thomas Bodley, ambassador of Queen Elizabeth. The generous overtures of this rich gentleman met with unanimous approbation. He offered to the library of the university the volumes collected by him during his travels on the Continent, whose value exceeded £10,000. The first stone of a new building was laid in 1610, but from 1602 the collection was open to readers in a provisional locality. David Loggan, the engraver, has preserved for us interior views of the Bodleian of the seventeenth century. The rooms are disposed in the form of the letter H, with pavilions to east and west, united by a gallery. The books were and are still in the body of the library, placed against the walls, with tables and immovable seats. The volumes were not displaced ; they were consulted in their own place. Each room had two floors, with access to the second by stairs.
      In London it was Hans Sloane who had the idea of founding a great collection by offering to the State for / THE BRITISH MUSEUM.  p.301 / £20,000 his collection of books, which was valued at £50,000. Created in 1753 by an Act of Parliament, the British Museum, as it was named, was quickly augmented by many private libraries, among which was the library of printed books and manuscripts collected by the kings of England from Henry VII. to William III., which was added in the reign of George II. The very extensive and valuable library of George III., 250,000 volumes, was added by George IV. The Harleian collection added 7,500 volumes, and Robert Cotton his manuscripts. To-day the printed books amount to 1,300,000, and are only surpassed by the National Library of France as well in number of books as in number of readers. This immense collection increases at a great rate, one source being the compulsory deposit of a copy of every new book in order to secure copyright. Donations and legacies are constantly being made, and an annual sum for purchases is voted by Parliament. Besides the copy deposited by publishers in the British Museum, the law of copyright compels the deposit of four other copies, which go to augment the collections of the Bodleian Library of Oxford, the University Library of Cambridge, and the libraries of Edinburgh and Dublin.
      If we search among the cities of Europe where establishments of this kind are most honoured, Berlin will take the third place with 900,000 printed books and 20,000 manuscripts, preserved in the Imperial Library. The building, constructed between 1775 and 1780, owes its special form to Frederick II., who desired that it should take the form of a chest of drawers. On / p.302 / the façade an inscription in the Latin tongue, but conceived in German spirit, indicates that here is a spiritual refectory—nutrimentum spiritus. Following come Munich, with 800,000 printed books ; Vienna 400,000 ; Dresden, 300,000 ; then the universities : Leipzig, whose library, founded in L409 [lit., another edition '1409'] and reorganised in 1830, contains 150,000 books and 2,000 manuscripts ; Heidelberg ; Göttingen, etc.
      In Italy, Florence keeps, in the National Library, 300,000 volumes, proceeding from various amateurs, and formed since 1860. The collection of the goldsmith Magliabecchi, that was open to readers since 1747, has been transported there. Besides this library, Florence possesses the celebrated Laurentian, created by Cosmo de Medicis in the middle of the fifteenth century, where are united more than 8,000 manuscripts of an incalculable value. Milan has at the Brera a collection of 200,000 printed books and 50,000 medals, and at the Ambrosian, due to Cardinal Frederick Borromeo, 160,000 printed books and 8,000 manuscripts.
      Rome possesses a dozen collections and celebrated deposits. The Vatican, not numerous, is most choice ; the importance of its manuscripts is known to the entire world, but only a part of the 50,000 printed books are catalogued. The Library of Victor Emmanuel, formerly of the Jesuits, amounts to about 66,000 volumes. At Venice the splendid monument called the Antiqua Libraria di St. Marco has changed its destination ; constructed in the sixteenth century and commenced by Sansovino for a library, it is now a royal palace. This city has lost that which had made its glory, and its collections are very modest in our days.

/ PUBLIC LIBRARIES OF THE UNITED STATES.  p.303 /

      The magnificent educational establishments in the form of public libraries provided in the United States deserve special mention. Nearly every city has its public library, supported by a small tax ; and many large libraries are wholly supported by private munificence. The first to be established was founded in 1732 by Benjamin Franklin in Philadelphia, and still exists as the Library Company ; many important bequests have been made to it, the latest being £200,000 by Dr. Richard Rush. The library now numbers 150,000 volumes. The Congressional Library of Washington, besides its annual income from Government, receives by deposit for copyright a copy of every work published in the United States ; it now has 565,000 volumes.
      The Astor Library and the Lenox Library of New York were both founded and endowed by the families whose name they bear ; the former has 223,284 volumes, the latter 25,000. The city of Chicago recently fell heir to the magnificent sum of over one million sterling for the establishment of a library of reference, and New York was benefited by the late Mr. Tilden to the extent of £800,000 for a public library.
      When we have named the libraries of St. Petersburg and Moscow for Russia, Stockholm for Sweden, and the Escurial for Spain, we shall have mentioned very hastily the most important establishments in the world. For more than four centuries the love of books has preserved and fortified itself, and increases each day. If we were to endeavour to approximately imagine the number of printed books diffused, we should be / p.304 / frightened at it. It is by miles that to-day are counted the shelves of the National Library or of the British Museum ; and each year the production is accelerated, as is also the number of readers.