four people around a shieldBOOK-PLATE OF CHARLES DE SALES.
It is from their possessors that French book-plates derive their chief interest; and these possessors arefor the most part persons who lived at a late date. Amongst the few early celebrities is the soldier-poet of France, Francis de Malherbe, of whom it has been said that he was as lax in morals as he was rigid in his zeal for the purity of his native language. His book-plate is figured atp. 25, and is interesting as showing that no reliance can be placed on lines, apparently expressing the colour of the shield in early Armorial book-plates (seepp. 21-22). He died in 1628. The books containing this very pleasing book-plate passed after De Malherbe's death to Vincent de Boyer, in whose family they remained till the Revolution; after that they were dispersed.
Coming to later times, we find a charming book-plate, engraved by Le Grand for the unfortunate Countess Dubarry. Her books were well chosen and well bound, but they were few in number; hence her book-plate is rare, but it may be seen in the library at Versailles, where most of her books are preserved. Though she could not read, she seems to have felt in duty bound to follow 'La Pompadour' in getting together a library to amuse her royal master.
From the book-plate of the countess—a woman who, after aiding in the general degradation of the French court, was willing to risk her life for those whose downfall she had in a measure assisted in bringing about—we may appropriately turn to that of Cardinal Maury; the inscription on which reads:Bibliothèque particulière de son Eminence Mgr. le Cardinal Maury. This book-plate calls to mind afamous figure in the French Revolution,—a fervent preacher, the spokesman of his fellow-clergy before those who were but little inclined to listen to argument; the calm-minded man, who would turn round and give a witty retort to a cry raised by the mob which followed through the streets of Paris, clamouring for his blood.
The mention of these names leads one naturally to speak generally of book-plates engraved about the time of the French Revolution,—a period which is immortalised in a singular manner on French book-plates. M. Poulet Malassis remarks that many a noble library owner took good care to alter his book-plate in those troublesome times, and to replace the coronet which had surmounted the family escutcheon by the Phrygian cap of liberty. For instance, the Viscount de Borbon-Busset in 1793 changed his Armorial book-plate to a simple inscription—in which he calls himself 'Citoyen François'—surrounded by a leafy garland. The same fashion is exemplified even in clerical examples. Father le Mercier in his first book-plate displays the coronet which he either was, or at least considered himself to be, entitled to bear; but between 1789 and 1792 we find a second example of his book-plate, with a simple decorative finish to the top of the design in lieu of the coronet. At that time there was in France, as Mr. Walter Hamilton puts it, 'an awkward fashion of putting heads accustomed to coronets under the falling knife of the guillotine.'
As far as the classifying of the leading styles inFrench book-plates goes, M. Poulet Malassis does not really help us much; and we cannot but hope that ere long some enterprising French collector will undertake the task. There is certainly, as M. Poulet Malassis observes, a resemblance—as the reader will see by turning back to the illustration of De Malherbe's book-plate—between the style of the first French book-plates and that of the first English; and it is noteworthy that the style disappeared in both countries much at the same time. Again, French book-plates of 1720-1730 bear distinct traces of what we have called 'Jacobean' work in speaking of English examples.
The FrenchRococobook-plate is really analogous to our 'Chippendale.' There is, however, a greater variety both of subject and treatment in each French style than one finds in England.
Allegory is, as I stated inChapter iv., more frequent and more wild in French book-plates than in those of England. The follies of his own countrymen in this respect are fully recognised by M. Poulet Malassis, who, in most amusing style, deals with some of the more pronounced examples; as for instance the rollicking allegory displayed in the book-plate of M. Hénault, President of the French Academy. The date of this remarkable production may be fixed at 1750; it is designed by Boucher and engraved by Count de Caylus, and we see that Minerva has honoured M. le Président by placing his family arms upon her shield. Verywonderful, too, is the book-plate of the Abbé de Gricourt, whose arms are borne heavenwards by a vast company of angels. This example, which is approximately of the same date as the last, is the work of the Abbé's brother, A. T. Ceys, who was himself an ecclesiastic. Often the allegory displayed has allusion to the owner's business or his tastes, as on that of M. Gueullette, a French novelist and dramatist of the first half of the last century, the popularity of whose writings, although those writings are numerous, has not outlived him. This book-plate is the work of H. Becat, and is inscribed after the Pirckheimer manner, 'Ex libris Thomæ Gueullette et Amicorum.' The family arms are supported by an Italian harlequin, a Chinese mandarin, a Cyclops holding an infant, and a Tartar. Now the presence of these strange inhabitants of a book-plate is accounted for thus. Gueullette wrote farces for the Paris stage, and he also wrote 'Contes Tartares' and 'Les Aventures du Mandarin Fum Hoam.' Below the shield water pours from a satyr's mouth into a basin containing a mermaid, and above soars Cupid in clouds, bearing aloft a scroll and motto. This, says 'W. H.' in theEx Libris Journal, is probably one of the earliest book-plates on which appear allegoric allusions to its owner's tastes and literary labours.
TheTypicalorPersonalbook-plate is also found in France in that of the Chevalier de Fleurieu, described by Mr. Egerton Castle. During theancien régimehe was a naval officer, who, whilst still low in the service,was intrusted with the testing of various new marine appliances. On the book-plate we get the bird's-eye view of an island, on which are strewn the said marine appliances, and behind them stands the Chevalier's coat of arms.
A recent writer on French book-plates, M. Henri Bouchot, goes so far as to think a book-plate may be of service as exhibiting a man's character. It may be so with regard to Frenchmen and French book-plates, but if this principle of argument be applied to English book-plates, all I can say is, that the possessors of English book-plates in the closing years of the seventeenth century and the opening years of the eighteenth must have been singularly alike in their personal characteristics!
Amadeus Lulin's
The 'Library Interior' book-plate is found in France as early as 1718, in an anonymous book-plate described by Mr. Walter Hamilton in theBook Wormfor May 1892. It shows us, in the background of a library, two men working a printing-press. In the foreground are five little winged cupids at play with books and mathematical instruments, whilst a female figure, representing peace and plenty, appears seated on what Mr. Hamilton conjectures to be a Pegasus. The engraving is by Bernard Picart, an eminent engraver, who, though a Frenchman by birth, settled at Amsterdam in 1710 (he died in 1733) and was evidently much influenced by the then prevailing style in Dutch art. He executed another very beautiful 'Library Interior' plate (figured opposite) forAmadeus Lulin, a Savoyard. Here we have the interior of a French library of the period, with a curved roof. At the end of the room is a window and beneath this a LouisXV.table. In the foreground the same cupids 'play with books,' which, by the way, they are treating exceedingly badly. Caryatides at the sides form a frame for the plate. On the breast of one is a sun; the other holds a heart. A globe surmounts each. The arms are shown in the centre of the design at the top.
Other examples of French book-plates of this kind are found quite late in the century, and any one who feels specially interested in the subject of these, and indeed of 'Library Interior' book-plates as a whole, will do well to study Sir Arthur Vicars's valuable treatise and lists in the pages of theEx Libris Journal.
About the book-plates of countries other than Germany and France there is not very much to be said. Sweden has given us an insight into its native book-plates.[9]Herr Carlander tells us that the earliest date on a Swedish book-plate is 1595, which occurs on that belonging to Thure Bielke, a senator who, having mixed himself up in political strife, lost his head by a stroke of the executioner's axe five years later. Senator Bielke was evidently far in advance of his fellow-countrymen as regards such matters; for no other dated Swedish book-plate occurs for a considerable number of years. In the eighteenthcentury, however, Swedish book-plates became much more numerous, and some of the more prominent native engravers appear to have worked upon them, producing a few singularly fine examples in theRococostyle; library interiors also appear occasionally on Swedish book-plates. One of the most interesting late examples of book-plates of this country is that of King CharlesXIII.On this we have the royal arms of Sweden, surmounted by the collar and cross of the order of the Seraphim, and the king's motto, 'Folkets wäl mint hogsta lag'—'The people's weal my highest law.' I imagine that this book-plate may be placed at the close of the last century. Charles died in 1818.
Swiss book-plates are numerous and early. The first dated example occurs in 1607. Their general style is not pleasing, since it presents a stiffness and awkwardness in the arrangement of the decoration. Italian book-plates, again, possess few remarkable features. Perhaps their leading characteristic is the extreme coldness of their engravers' touch. One of these engravers was, however, a famous man, whose work deserves more than passing mention. I mean Raphael Morghen, the Florentine artist, who died in 1833, and who is said to have been able to engrave a plate when he was only twelve years old. It is curious to turn from his large engravings of the chief works in the gallery at Florence, to the unusually small work which enables us to reckon him here among the engravers of book-plates.This is a representation of the arms of the Duke of Cassano Serra, framed in a shelly frame, somewhat 'Chippendale' in appearance, but with the stiff, heavy 'Jacobean' wreath clinging closely to it. In a scroll which winds in and out of this wreath is the inscription: 'Il Duca Cassano Serra'; it is signed 'R. Morghen f[ecit].'
A careful investigation of the Vatican and other Italian libraries would probably lead to the discovery of some more papal book-plates. Sir Wollaston Franks tells me that amongst his numerous engravings of the papal arms, there is only one which he feels sure was ever used as a book-plate. The late Sir George Dasent, inNotes and Queries,[10]describes what he considers the book-plate of Maffeo Barberini, UrbanVIII.; but he does not tell us what leads him to the belief that the engraving is really a book-plate.
About Spanish book-plates not much is yet known, and it seems likely that the majority of examples usually classed as Spanish were designed and executed in Flanders. The family of Bouttats—the original Bouttats had, says Walpole, twenty sons, of whom twelve became engravers—executed some of these book-plates. Amongst their work is one which Lord De Tabley styles 'a gloomy yet striking heraldic study'; it is signed 'P. B. Bouttats, sculp.,' and was probably engraved about the middle of the seventeenth century. It shows us the arms of abishop surmounted by a plumed helmet, above which again is a bishop's hat, with pendent ropes and tassels; beneath is the motto: 'Por la Leÿ Bezerra ÿ por el Rëy.' A particularly fine example of Flemish heraldic art is furnished by the book-plate engraved and signed by J. Harrewyn, of Brussels, and dated 1723; the inscription gives us quite a biographical sketch: 'Messire Charles Bonaventure, Comte vander Noot, Baron de Schoonhoven et de Mares &ca; Conseiller de sa MateImpleet Catheau souverain Conseil de Brabant par patante du 9 Mars 1713, Reçu aux Etats nobles de Brabant, fils de Messire Rogier Wouthier, en son vivant Baron de Carloo &ca; et deputez ordinaire au dit corps de la noblesse des Etats de Brabant, et de Dame Anne Louÿse vander Gracht, née Baronne de Vrempde et d'Olmen, &ca.'
Our knowledge of Russian or Polish book-plates is chiefly derived from the illustrations shown in Monsieur S. J. Siennicki's work, entitledLes Elzevirs de la Bibliothèque de L'Université Impériale de Varsovie. Here we have some examples of the book-plates both of distinguished laymen and ecclesiastics. The probability is that none are of an early date, and they are certainly not conspicuous as works of art. The Russian style is perhaps the more distinct, though in many respects resembling the French, especially that shown in the more pronounced examples of the LouisXV.epoch.
AMERICAN BOOK-PLATES
WHATEVER an American collects, he collects well: he works with a will and energy that loosens his purse-strings in a manner which makes the acquisition of valuable specimens a comparatively easy matter. It is well, therefore, that book-plate collecting has found its way over the Atlantic, and that there is now a goodly body of American book-plate collectors who are giving the requisite amount of attention to American examples, and who are not keeping to themselves the result of their labours. In the first edition of this book I wrote: 'No doubt, ten years hence, we shall know a great deal more about American book-plates'; and already the appearance of Mr. Charles Dexter Allen's[11]interesting and carefully composed account of them has enabled me materially to improve this chapter, which I have devoted to them.
The majority of book-plates which bear upon them American addresses, especially those belonging tothe Southern States, many of which appear with the opening of the eighteenth century, are, without doubt, the work of engravers in the then mother-country.[12]The library owners of Virginia sent to England for these book-plates, or their sons ordered them there, whilst paying the orthodox visit to one of the universities, and brought them home, either for their own use or for the use of their fathers. The northern book-plates, though much later, are mostly the work of artists born and bred, or at least settled, in America.
Foremost in interest and earliest in date of these American address-plates is that of William Penn, on which he styles himself 'Proprietor of Pensylvania.' This is designed in the ordinary 'Simple Armorial' style then common in England, and is dated in 1702. It is therefore subsequent to Penn's last visit to his 'plantation,' and cannot have been the work of an engraver on that side of the Atlantic. After his death, the inscription on this book-plate was altered, for his son's use, to 'Thomas Penn of Stoke Pogeis, in the county of Bucks, first proprietor of Pensilvania (sic).' The expression 'first' must here be evidently read as 'chief' or 'principal.' The fact of this alteration is important for collectors to note, as copies of William Penn's book-plate are frequently offered for sale, which—they are palpably recent impressions—are said to be struck from theoriginal plate; a statement which, from the fact mentioned, may be at once discredited.[13]
Next in point of date is a much more ornate book-plate, the inscription on which reads: 'William Byrd of Westover, in Virginia, Esquire.' It is an elaborate piece of work, excellently engraved in the style of the majority of English book-plates of 1720 or thereabouts, 'Simple Armorial,' but with indications of Jacobean decoration. William Byrd was born in Virginia, 28th March 1694; he was sent to England to be educated, and returned to his native country, having his mind 'stored with useful information to adorn its annals, his manners cultivated in royal Courts,' and with this book-plate, as a mark of his devotion to literature.
The famous Westover mansion, which may to-day be viewed from the James River, two hours' sail below Richmond, was for long the viceregal Court of Virginia. It was erected about the year 1678, by William Byrd, who left England when very young, and was father to his namesake, whose book-plate has just been described, the author of the famousWestover Manuscripts, compiled in 1732-33.
Some five years before the probable date of the Byrd book-plate, we have note of that belonging to 'Robert Elliston, gent., Comptrolrof His Majestie's Customs of New York in AmericaMDCCXXV.' This book-plate is quite 'Jacobean' in style, and was no doubt executed in England, and sent out to the colony. It is too fine a piece of work to be the production of any colonial engraver of that date.
But the interest attaching to book-plates bearing upon them American addresses, and used by residents in America, is obviously not so great as that awakened by examples which were also actually produced in America,—examples which at once give us an insight into the state of the engraver's art, and of the artistic feeling then existing there.
The earliest of these is the book-plate of the 'Rev. John Williams,' first minister of Deerfield, Mass., dated in 1679. The next, in 1704, that of Thomas Prince, an American born and bred, who graduated from Harvard College in 1707, and paid his first visit to England in 1709, so that his book-plate may be taken as genuinely American. In design it resembles dozens of English examples,—a rough woodcut border of national emblems, within which is the inscription, 'Thomæ Prince Liber, Anno Domini, 1704'; the sequence of the words in the inscription, the reader will notice, being somewhat unusual. The Prince Library was bequeathed to a Society, which became known as 'the New England Library,' and which itself had a similar label prepared recording the gift. A part of the collection is now in the Boston Public Library.
But these two examples stand by themselves; it is not until the middle of the eighteenth century thatany number of book-plates of American execution are found; after that, there are a really considerable quantity. Their style is not particularly distinctive; it is at first either Jacobean or 'Chippendale,' or a combination of the two styles; later, the 'wreath and ribbon,' and landscape and pictorial styles are introduced and treated much as in England. In execution, American book-plates are perhaps a trifle coarse. The more prominent of their engravers seem to have been—Hurd, Dawkins, Anderson, Johnson, Callendar, Doolittle, the Mavericks, Revere, and Turner. Revere is the best known; he was a picture engraver of some merit; but for the most part the names quoted are those of men of little artistic reputation. Nathaniel Hurd was probably the earliest of these engravers, and not the worst. He was born at Boston in 1729, the son of an American, who was a goldsmith in that town. Nathaniel was his father's apprentice; he devoted himself to working on copper, and so naturally would turn his attention to book-plates. Probably the earliest example, signed by him as 'N. H.,' and dated in 1749, was designed for Thomas Dering. This is the earliest signed and dated American book-plate yet brought to light; Hurd was barely twenty when he produced it. As a seal and book-plate engraver he worked hard and well; he died in 1777. One of his most original book-plates is that of Harvard College. A curiously short and wide shield, bearing the college arms, is encircled by a band bearing the inscription, 'Sigill. Coll. Harvard. Cantab.Nov. Angl. 1650.' Outside this circle are two leaf sprays, tied at the base and nearly meeting at the top. Both in conception and execution this is a very peculiar book-plate. The Dering plate, on the other hand, is interesting as showing how exactly the style of the mother-country at that period was copied in America. Here we have a pure 'Chippendale' book-plate of an unpronounced type.
Henry Dawkins (who began life by designing metal buttons) had been for a long time resident in America, when, in 1754, he engraved the book-plate of 'John Burnet of New York.' Like the Dering plate, Burnet's is interesting, and for the same reason; it is 'Chippendale,' but distinctlylaterChippendale, with cupids and other figures introduced. Dawkins was found guilty of counterfeiting, and begged to be hanged rather than suffer the imprisonment to which he had been condemned. Whether or not his request was granted we do not know.
That the heraldry on some of these American book-plates should be startling, is only to be expected. Take, for instance, the very interesting book-plate of Robert Dinwiddie, Deputy-Governor of Virginia from 1751-58, which was probably engraved a few years before the earlier date. Here we have the shield divided fesse-fashion, and in the upper and lower divisions landscapes,—the first introducing an Indian archer shooting at a stag, and the lower a fort or castle with a ship at sea sailing towards it. Dinwiddie was a good servant to the English Crownboth in Barbadoes and Virginia, and is said, like most successful people of his day, to be descended from an ancient family, though his immediate ancestors were Glasgow merchants. We are, however, not asked to believe, and we should not, if we were, that the arms are more ancient than Governor Dinwiddie himself, or that theyoriginatedelsewhere than in his mercantile brain, though they may have been legallygrantedby the Scotch College of Arms. The plate looks 'Scotch'—it is 'Chippendale,' and, I suspect, was engraved in the mother-country by a Scotch engraver. We may date it about 1750.
There are, of course, some American book-plates specially interesting from their possessors, and foremost amongst them is that of George Washington. For its description I cannot do better than quote Mr. Allen: 'The arms are displayed upon a shield of the usual shell-like form, and the sprays and rose-branches of this style [Chippendale] are used in the ornamentation of the sides of the escutcheon. The motto,Exitus acta probat, is given upon its ribbon at the base of the shield, and the name is engraved, in script, on the bracket at the bottom of the design. In general appearance the plate is like scores of Chippendale plates of the period.' I am sorry to take, somewhat, from the interest which attaches to this book-plate, by saying that, as I look more closely into it and study the details of its ornamentation and its execution, I am convinced it was engraved in England and not in America; it must therefore beof an earlier date than that attributed to it. I do not think it is subsequent to 1760. Of course there is a forgery of this plate, though it was prepared, not because of the value of the book-plate, but to sell a number of books which were said to have belonged to George Washington himself, and to have been captured in Virginia. The fraud was, however, discovered. No doubt these forgeries are now palmed off as the great man's book-plate. Mr. Lichtenstein's words about the real book-plate and the sham are therefore important:—
'Original examples are noticeable for their sharp black impressions on dampened plate paper of a buff colour mellowed by age. Those of the imitation are printed from a plate which has the appearance of having seen considerable wear; besides being printed on a dry paper of a thin quality, and a bluish colour; by its modern appearance it is easily recognised, the engraving of the name being poorly done.'
I do not know if a series of 'Presidents'' book-plates could be shown to exist, but Washington's successor, John Adams, certainly used one, introducing into it a certain number of national emblems. The American eagle with outspread wings overshadows the whole design.
Of American women, in the early days of independence, only one is known to have used a book-plate. This lady was Elizabeth Græme, the youngest child of Dr. Thomas Græme, member ofthe Provincial Council, and in other ways a distinguished and wealthy citizen, who owned Græme Park, an estate lying some twenty miles from Philadelphia. Elizabeth was born in 1737. At seventeen she was engaged to be married, but her engagement was suddenly—why, we learn not—broken off. To divert her mind, she set to work to translateTélémaque. She carried out the task, but it was never published, and lies to-day, as she wrote it, in the Philadelphia Museum. Her next engagement was to a man ten years her junior—a Mr. Ferguson; him she married, but, her husband taking the Crown's part, they separated. By the time of her death, in 1801, she had grown needy, despite the fact that she received money from her literary productions, which were numerous. Though evidently a staunch Republican, she was the bearer of the famous letter from the Rev. Jacob Duché to Washington, in which the writer begged his correspondent to return 'to his allegiance to the King.' The book-plate, which is, in every way, curious and interesting, is Armorial.
An interesting point about American book-plates—which illustrates a distinctive feature in social life there—is the existence of a large number belonging to Friendly Societies, Mutual Improvement Societies, and institutions akin to them; for the books forming the libraries of these bodies contain some of the most curious and characteristic American book-plates. Amongst the number may be mentionedthose of the New York Society Library, the Farmington Library, the Hasty Pudding Society and the Porcellian Club in Harvard College, the Linonian Society and the Brothers of Unity in Yale, and the Social Friends in Dartmouth College.
None of these are particularly early, indeed the majority must be dated after the establishment of independence, but they are well worthy of study. Allegory runs wild in the book-plates—there are three mentioned by Mr. Dexter Allen—of the first-named Society, and Minerva is prominent in all. Let me endeavour to describe two, both the work of Maverick. In one she hands a volume of the Society's Library to an Indian, whose attitude in receiving it suggests that he had never seen a book before; in which case its contents cannot have done him much good. In the other she has just descended from Olympus, entered the library, and seized a volume from the book-shelf, which she presents to an apparently more appreciative red-skin. I say appreciative, for in return he hands the goddess his tomahawk. Minerva with a tomahawk! Can anything be more delightfully absurd?
One might go on with many pages of these descriptions, but enough has been said to show the burlesque spirit in which allegory is treated, doubtless quite unintentionally, on American Society book-plates. In that fact lies much of their interest. More happy in conception and execution is the homelier design appearing on the book-plate of the Village Libraryin Farmington, which, if not a beautiful piece of engraving, is at least free from grotesqueness.
'In this,' says Mr. Allen, 'we see the interior of a room in which a young lady patron of the library is storing her mind with those choice axioms which, if put in practice, far exceed the attractiveness of mere personal beauty; so says the couplet beneath the picture:—
'Beauties in vain, their pretty eyes may roll;Charms strike the sense, but merit wins the soul.
A writer in theEx Libris Journalpoints out that, after the Revolution, till about the year 1810, there were scarcely any American armorial book-plates. Perhaps one of the earliest is that of 'Samuel Elam, Rhode Island,' which appears to have been engraved about 1800. It is 'Pictorial' in style, and shows a shield, bearing arms, resting against a tree-stump, with a landscape background. The majority of American book-plate possessors, from 1810 until the fashion of using a book-plate became common some little time back, seem to have been members of the legal profession.
During the last few years many American book-plates have been as wild and meaningless in design as the majority of those recently produced in England; although, as Mr. Allen's illustrations show us, a few truly artistic and appropriate examples have appeared. One modern book-plate from across the Atlantic is sure to attract English eyes;for the owner's works are read as eagerly, and appreciated as fully, here as in the States,—I mean that of 'Oliver Wendell Holmes.' This, too, is appropriate for the man, consisting simply of a motto-scroll, on which is writtenPer Ampliora ad Altiora, and a nautilus—'the ship of pearl,' as he calls it; 'the venturous bark that flings
'On the sweet summer winds its purpled wingsIn gulfs enchanted where the siren sings,And coral reefs lie bare,Where the cold sea maids rise to sun their streaming hair.'
INSCRIPTIONS ON BOOK-PLATES IN CONDEMNATION OF BOOK-STEALING OR BOOK-SPOILING, AND IN PRAISE OF STUDY
I proposenow to speak about the inscriptions on book-plates, and I will divide them as follows:—(1) Sentiments in condemnation of book-stealing or book-spoiling; (2) sentiments in praise of books or of study; and (3) personal particulars of the owner of the book-plate, which last class shall receive attention in a separate chapter. In all three cases illustrations may be appropriately drawn both from English and foreign examples.
Let me begin by calling the reader's attention to the fact, which I commented upon in my first chapter, that in nearly all inscriptions on book-plates it is the volume in which the book-plate is placed, and not the book-plate itself, that is spokesman. Take the inscription on one of the earliest examples: 'Liber Bilibaldi Pirckheimer, Sibi et amicis.' Bilibald Pirckheimer's book for himself and his friends! Here is an amiable intention; but the plan did not work, and we do not find the sentiment often repeated. In the good jurist's day printed books were not numerous, and they were costly. Then might a man be reasonablyregarded as a dog in the manger, who shut the door of his bookcase against those anxious to benefit by the work of the printing-press; then mankind at large had not demonstrated the fact that general morality does not extend to returning borrowed books. Hence, I say, it was that on this early book-plate we have the expression 'Sibi et amicis.'
School-boys—and I dare say, if one could only learn the truth in such matters, school-girls too—have a habit of inscribing their school-books with verses, denouncing in decidedly forcible language the school-fellow who steals—i.e.borrows and forgets to return—any particular volume, and at the end of these verses is depicted a gallows from which hangs the lifeless body of the thief. When did school-boys first thus protect their possessions? Few school-books survive for use by many successive generations, so we have no means of answering the question satisfactorily; but in a book—not a school-book—published in 1540, there are written (so a correspondent ofNotes and Queriesinforms us), in writing more than three centuries old, these lines below the owner's signature:—
'My Master's name above you se,Take heede therefore you steale not mee;For if you doe, without delayYour necke ... for me shall pay.Looke doune below and you shal seeThe picture of the gallowstree;Take heede therefore of thys in time,Lest on this tree you highly clime.'[Drawing of the gallows.]
So the school-boy's doggerel is at least founded on an ancient model, which we have quoted, though not actually appearing on a book-plate, because it was clearly intended to do duty as one.
Of exactly the same date is a very pompous declaration, on a German book-plate, of a donor's intention that certain volumes given by him should remain for ever in the library to which they are presented. The owner of the book-plate was John Faber, Bishop of Vienna, who died in 1541, and who, in the previous year, presented his books to the College of St. Nicholas in that city. Here is a translation given by Lord De Tabley, in which mark how in kingly fashion the bishop refers to himself as 'we':—
'This book was bought by us, Dr. John Faber, Bishop of Vienna, and assistant in the Government of the New State, both as councillor and confessor to the most glorious, clement, and pious Ferdinand, King of the Romans, Hungary, and Bohemia, and Archduke of Austria. And since, indeed, that money (which purchased this volume) did not arise from the revenues and properties of our diocese, but from our own most honest labours in other directions. And therefore it is free to us to give or bequeath the book to whomsoever we please. We accordingly present it to our College of St. Nicholas. And we ordain that this volume shall remain there for ever for the use of the students, according to our order and decree. Done in our Episcopal Court at Vienna, on the first day of September in the year of Grace 1540.'
Thomas Lilienthal's
Dr. Faber was famous for his orthodoxy and his fervour in enforcing it; so much so, that he earned for himself the titleMalleus hereticorum. He does not trust himself to express his opinion of the too eager student who should take to himself a volume from amongst these books; which is perhaps well.
More polite than the English verses of 1540, and therefore not half so serviceable, are those printed on an actual book-plate, by which Andrew Hedio, a Königsberg professor of philosophy, who lived about the middle of the seventeenth century, sought to insure the safe return to his library of any volume which was out on loan. The arms of Hedio—the head and shoulders of an old bearded man in a fish-tailed nightcap—appear on the book-plate, and below, supposed to be spoken by the volume, are Latin verses, which in free translation may be rendered:—
'By him who bought me for his own,I'm lent for reading leaf by leaf;If honest, you'll return the loan,If you retain me, you're a thief.'
If you turn back top. 123and look at the book-plate of Speratus, you will see that he had expressed very much this sentiment more than a century before.
It is not till the beginning of the eighteenth century that we find any decided expression of possession on an English book-plate. Then it occurs on that of John Reilly (described onp. 53). At the very bottom of the design is printed: 'Clamabunt omnes te, liber, esse meum.' Here you see it is JohnReilly himself and not his book that speaks. It is a mild and decidedly gentlemanly way of expressing ownership, free from threats for not returning the volume; indeed, hardly contemplating the possibility of so dishonest an act.
About the same date as Reilly's book-plate is a very graceful German one, executed for Michael Lilienthal (figured onp. 165). It shows us a group of growing lilies, around which bees are hovering or tasting their sweetness, and below—
'Use the book, but let no one misuse it;The bee does not stain the lilies, but only touches them.'
From this graceful book-plate and the pleasantry of its inscription, we turn to a heavy declamatory sentence, devised,circa1730, by the librarian of the Benedictine monastery of Wessenbrun, in Bavaria, for the books in his charge to speak when a theft had been actually committed or was in contemplation: 'I am the rightful possession of the Cloister of Wessenbrun. Ho there! Restore me to my master, so right demands!'
Sherlock Willis, whose book-plate—a decided 'Chippendale'—is dated in 1756, flies to Scripture for his aid against immoral borrowers, and places on his book-plate the familiar quotation from the 37th Psalm: 'The ungodly borroweth, and payeth not again.' Various other English book-plates bear the same quotation, or some other taken from the Bible. On that in use at the Parochial Library of Tadcaster, which shows us St. John in the isle of Patmos receiving from the angel the book which hewas to eat, we read: 'Accipe librum et devora illum' (Rev. x. 9); advice which it was not, we may presume, intended that the borrower should follow literally.
Garrick's
There is something very businesslike and to the point about the inscription on the book-plate of Charles Ferdinand Hommeau, which is dated six years after that of Sherlock Willis. The inscription reads in translation: 'If you do not return the loan within fourteen days, or do not keep it carefully, on another occasion [when you ask to borrow it or some other book] I shall say I have not got it.' So M. Hommeau will not mind telling a lie to protect his library; and what is more, does not mind telling the world of his intention to do so. Truly he was an honest liar.
David Garrick (whose book-plate is figured opposite) selected as an appropriate quotation for his book-plate the following, taken from the fourth volume ofMenagiana:—'La première chose qu'on doit faire quand on a emprunté un livre, c'est de le lire afin de pouvoir le rendre plutôt.' Very good advice, no doubt; but I wonder if 'Davy' was careful enough to confine his loans to those who would follow it? This reminds me of a very nicely put passage of Lord De Tabley's,à proposof the subject of book-borrowing in general:—
'Now this batch of mottoes raises the point, whether valuable books should be lent to persons who treat volumes like coal scuttles; who perpetrate suchatrocities as moistening their thumbs to turn a page over; who hold a fine binding before a roaring fire? who,horribile dictu, read at breakfast, and use, as a book-marker, the butter-knife. Ought Garrick to have lent the cream of his Shakespeare quartos to slovenly and mole-eyed Samuel Johnson? We think emphatically not! Many full-grown folks have no more idea of handling a book than has a school-boy.'
So far the 'caveats' on book-plates have been either original compositions or quotations, specially selected by the owner; but, as time went on, people did not trouble to compose their own verses or inscriptions, or to hunt up appropriate quotations. The same lines or words appear fastened beneath, or printed upon, the book-plates of many different persons; in the latter case the book-plate is generally little more than a name ticket. Here is one, composed early in this century, which could be bought of C. Talbot, at 174 Tooley Street, and on it the purchaser could write his name before affixing it in his volumes:—
'THIS BOOKBELONGS TO
. . . . . . . .If thou art borrowed by a friend,Right welcome shall he beTo read, to study, not to lend,But to return to me.Not that imparted knowledge dothDiminish learning's store;But Books, I find, if often lent,Return to me no more.Read slowly, Pause frequently,Think seriously,Keep cleanly, return duly,With the corners of the leaves not turned down.'
Of about the same date is another little effusion, which clearly does not contemplate the purchaser being the possessor of auniquevolume, or of one for any cause irreplaceable, if lost:—
'THIS BOOK BELONGS TO
. . . . . . . . . .Neither blemish this book, nor the leaves double down,Nor lend it to each idle friend in the town;Return it when read, or, if lost, please supplyAnother as good to the mind and the eye.'
In these last quoted examples are certainly many stipulations, but they are as nought when compared with what we find on the book-plate of the Cavalier Francesco Vargas Macciucca, who was in the habit of pasting on the fly-leaf of the book, opposite his book-plate,fifteenrules, written in Latin, to be observed by those who borrowed books from his library. If he enforced them, he can have been seldom troubled with a borrower!
On the face of them,—since most of them have a blank space left for the owner's name, etc.,—these poetic or prosaic threats against book-stealers and the ill-usage of books do not pretend to be the compositions of those that used them. Jones or Brown went to the nearest stationer or bookseller, and purchased his admonitions all ready composed. Buteven after the introduction of ready-made admonitions, we find the man of independent mind rebelling against saving his library from spoliation by anybody's words save his own. Such a person was Mr. Charles Clark, of Great Totham Hall, near Witham, in Essex, who can at least claim originality for his composition, which, if lengthy, has occasional gleams of humour. Here it is:—