Book-Lovers, Bibliomaniacs and Book Clubs | Page 6

gives any added value to a set of subscription books, will to me, I fear, forever remain a disentangled enigma. I was once applied to by an agent representing a $6000 "Autograph Edition" of Jean Jacques Rousseau. Having never seen Rousseau's autograph, I asked that it be shown me. "Oh," said the agent, "Rousseau himself don't sign the copies, but the set will be signed by the publishers." Would not a much less expensive and more expeditious way of obtaining publishers' autographs be found in writing a postal card of inquiry for the "prices and terms" on their publications?
Gilpin has left the following quaint account of the eccentric old bibliomaniac, Henry Hastings, the uncompanionable neighbor of Anthony Cooper, Earl of Shaftesbury. The accompanying pen-and-ink sketch represents Louis Maynelle's idealization of this interesting character; it was made especially for this volume:--
"Mr. Hastings was low of stature, but strong and active, of a ruddy complexion, with flaxen hair. His clothes were always of green cloth. His house was of the old fashion; in the midst of a large park, well stocked with deer, rabbits, and fish-ponds. He had a long narrow bowling green in it, and used to play with round sand bowls. Here too he had a banqueting room built, like a stand in a large tree.
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"He kept all sorts of hounds that ran buck, fox, hare, otter, and badger; and had hawks of all kinds, both long and short winged. His great hall was commonly strewed with marrow-bones, and full of hawk-perches, hounds, spaniels, and terriers. The upper end of it was hung with fox-skins of this and the last year's killing. Here and there a polecat was intermixed and hunter's poles in great abundance. The parlour was a large room, completely furnished in the same style. On a broad hearth, paved with brick, lay some of the choicest terriers, hounds and spaniels. One or two of the great chairs had litters of cats in them, which were not to be disturbed. Of these, three or four always attended him at dinner, and a little white wand lay by his trencher, to defend it if they were too troublesome. In the windows, which were very large, lay his arrows, cross-bows, and other accoutrements. The corners of the room were filled with his best hunting and hawking poles. His oyster table stood at the lower end of the room, which was in constant use twice a day, all the year round; for he never failed to eat oysters both at dinner and supper, with which the neighbouring town of Pool supplied him.
"At the upper end of the room stood a small table with a double desk, one side of which held a church Bible; the other the Book of Martyrs. On different tables in the room lay hawks' hoods, bells, old hats with their crowns thrust in, full of pheasant eggs, tables, dice, cards, and store of tobacco pipes. At one end of this room was a door, which opened into a closet, where stood bottles of strong beer and wine, which never came out but in single glasses, which was the rule of the house, for he never exceeded himself nor permitted others to exceed.
"Answering to this closet was a door into an old chapel, which had been long disused for devotion; but in the pulpit, as the safest place, was always to be found a cold chine of beef, a venison pasty, a gammon of bacon, or a great apple-pye, with thick crust, well baked. His table cost him not much, though it was good to eat at. His sports supplied all but beef and mutton, except on Fridays, when he had the best of fish. He never wanted a London pudding, and he always sang it in with 'My part lies therein-a.' He drank a glass or two of wine at meals; put syrup of gilly-flowers into his sack, and had always a tun glass of small beer standing by him, which he often stirred about with rosemary. He lived to be an hundred, and never lost his eyesight, nor used spectacles. He got on horseback without help, and rode to the death of the stag till he was past four-score."
It is said of George Steevens, the famous Shakespearian collector, that he "lived in a retired and eligibly situated house, just on the rise of Hampstead Heath. It was paled in, and had immediately before it a verdant lawn skirted with a variety of picturesque trees. Here Steevens lived, embosomed in books, shrubs and trees, being either too coy or too unsociable to mingle with his neighbours. His habits were indeed peculiar: not much to be envied or imitated, as they sometimes betrayed the flights of a madman and sometimes the asperities of a cynic. His attachments were