Leeds. James Miles, 34, Upperhead Row. No. 238. Christmas Catalogue offering a wide variety of good literature; some Rare First Issues, etc., etc.; also works on Art, Cruikshank, Dickens, French, Music, Shakespeare, Sport, Yorkshire, etc., etc.; and a section of books suitable for presentation. 877 items. No. 329. Clearance Catalogue of Miscellaneous Second-hand Books, and some Publishers' Remainders. 1073 items. Liverpool. W. M. Murphy, 79, Renshaw Street. No. 234. Catalogue of Interesting Books in various branches of Literature recently purchased from Private Libraries, etc.; comprising works on America, Economics, Ireland, Military, Natural History, Sport, etc., etc. 743 items. 236. Clearance Catalogue of Interesting Books on Agriculture, Art, China, French, Ireland, Russia, Scotland, Sport, etc., etc. 686 items. Peters Bros., 87, Victoria Street. No. 76. Catalogue of Choice and Interesting Books, both old and of recent date, including works on Architecture, Gardening, Law, Music, Natural History, Scotland, etc., etc. 341 items. London. Bailey Bros., 62, Newington Butts, S.E.11. No. 123. Second-hand Books, including works on Art and Architecture, Egypt, Family History, India, Military, Natural History, Sport, Topography, etc., etc. 1127 items. Francis Clarke, 9, Pond Place, S.W.3. No. 24. Catalogue of Books on America, Arctic, Botany, Folklore, London, Medical, Occult, Shakespeare, Theatrical, etc., etc. 871 items. No. 25. Collection of Books, including recent purchases from the Library of the Marquis of Ripon; the Theydon Mount Library, etc.; also works on Art and Artists, Bindings, Drama, France, Natural History, Religion, Sport, etc., etc. 1468 items. No. 26. Catalogue of Works on, and illustrative of, Shakespeare and his Times, indexed under the following headings: Baconiana, Maps, Music, Shakespeare Works, Pamphlets, etc. 1226 items. Davis & Orioli, 30, Museum Street, London, W.C.1. No. 27. First Editions of Modern Authors, including works by J. Barrie, W. de la Mare, W. H. Hudson, R. Kipling, etc., etc. 269 items. 40. Manuscripts and Early Printed Books from 15th to 18th century including works on Incunabula, Agriculture, Italy, Medicine, etc., etc. 699 items. London. Dulau & Co., Ltd., 34, Margaret Street, W.1. No. 144. Rare and Interesting Books recently purchased privately; comprising duplicates from the Library of John Drinkwater, selections from the Libraries of E. Beresford Chancellor, Sir Andrew Agnew, etc.; also works on America, Civil War, Heraldry, Mathematics, Plays, Shakespeare, Trade, Voyages, etc., etc.; and a List of First Editions of Modern Authors. 2424 items, with 17 fullpage plates and other illustrations. R. Fletcher, Ltd., 23, New Oxford Street, W.C.1. No. 27. Catalogue of Rare, Curious and Interesting Books, including works on America, Ceramics, Dickens, History, London, Natural History, Poetry, Sport, Topography, Travel, etc., etc. 1105 items. Grafton & Co., 51, Great Russell Street, W.C.1. No. 56. Catalogue of Printing and Bibliography, including Type, Specimens and Type Founding, Paper and Watermarks, Manuscripts and Palaeography, Engraving and Illustrations, Bookbinding, etc., etc. 1806 items. No. 57. Catalogue of Americana, Asia, Africa, and the Colonies, British and Foreign History, Topography and Biography. 729 items. Myers & Co., 102, New Bond Street, W.1. No. 256. Catalogue of Scarce and Interesting Books in all Branches of Literature, including America, Bindings, Drama, Economics, Husbandry, Law, Medical, Roses, Shakespeare, Sporting, Trials, Yorkshire, etc. with a selection of choice engraved portraits by Bartolozzi, from drawings by Holbein. 1027 items. No. 257 Illustrated Catalogue of Fine and Rare Books, including works on Binding, Cruikshank, Gardening, Law, London, Shakespeare, Sport, etc., also Illuminated Manuscripts, Historical Documents, Autograph Letters, etc., and 11 full-page plates. 343 items. George Winter, 52, Charing Cross Road, W.C.2. No. 116. Catalogue of a Miscellaneous Collection of Second-hand Books, including Sport, Travel, First Edition, Poetry, and General Literature. 783 items. Manchester. Albert Sutton, 43, Bridge Street. No. 264. Catalogue of Secondhand Books, comprising works on Africa, Chemistry, Lancashire, Mormonism, Naval, Oxford, Shakespeare, Sport, etc., etc. 468 items. No. 265. Interesting Books on Angling, Art, Drama, French, Horology, Lancashire, Shropshire, Sport, etc., etc. 493 items. No. 266. Catalogue of Miscellaneous Literature, including Collections of Ballad and Song Literature, Scotland, Shakespeare, etc. 516 items. Newcastle-on-Tyne. W. H. Robinson. 4-6, Nelson Street. No. 16. Miscellaneous Old Books, comprising works on America, France, Husbandry, Ireland, Jesuits, Law, Medical, Scotland, Shakespeare, Sport, Trade, etc., etc. 1123 items. R. D. Steedman, 17, Saville Row. No. 48. Rare and Interesting Books, including works on America, Art, Cookery, Egypt, Ireland, Military, Natural History, Scotland, Sport, etc., etc. 722 items. Oxford. Parker & Son, 27, Broad Street. No. 27. Catalogue of Antiquarian and Modern Books, comprising works on Agriculture, Astronomy, Classics, History, Law, Modern First Editions, Natural History, Politics, Sport, etc., etc. 2376 items. Plymouth. W. J. Butland, 4, Treville Street. No. 41. Catalogue of Secondhand Books, divided into two parts. Part I. comprises the Library of the late T. V. Hodgson, and includes works on Africa, Arctic, Cornwall, Egypt, Ireland, etc., with a Collection of Books relating to New Zealand. Part II. includes the Library of the late Cecil W. Wade, with works on Angling, Heraldry, Medical, Naval, Shakespeare, etc., etc. 1277 items. Preston. Harold Halewood, 37, Friargate. No. 18. Catalogue of Important and Valuable Books, Historical, Biographical, and Literary, including works on Australasia, Bibliography, Early Printed Books, Lancashire, Sport, etc., etc. 180 items. No. 19. Catalogue of Books from Lupset Hall, Wakefield; including fine copies of Adair's American Indians; Burney's Evelina; Hose and McDougall's Pagan Tribes, etc. 180 items. Tunbridge Wells. P. M. Barnard, 17, Church Road. No. 157. Catalogue of Books on Art, including Bindings, Drawings, Illuminated Manuscripts, Pictures; with a section of books on Alpine Climbing, and other Sports. 420 items. Wolverhampton. Henry Start, 28, Dudley Street. No. 43. Spring Catalogue of Antiquarian and other books in many branches of literature, including Wrexham. Crowes, Bank Street. No. 103. Catalogue of Books, including rare and important items in all branches of literature, with a collection relating to Wales. 338 items. OVERSEAS. Germany. Anvers. Moorthamers Frères, 33, Avenue de Keyser. No. 24. Catalogue of Ancient and Modern Books, including works on Archaeology, Fine Arts, France, History, Incunabula, Naval, Music, Philosophy, Theology, etc., etc. 1089 items. No. 25. Catalogue of Books, comprising works on America, Folklore, France, History, Medicine, Theology, etc., etc. 603 items. Frankfurt A/M. Joseph Baer & Co., Hochstrasse 6. No. 727. Theologiae Catholicae, indexed under the following heads: Biblia Sacra; Opera liturgica; Horae, Hymnarium, Missale, etc., Historia ecclesiastica, concilia et synodi; Roma, B. Mariae laudes, etc., etc. 1741 items. Together with a separate catalogue of plates. No. 730. Graphik, Kupferstiche und Holzschnite de XV. & XVI. Jahrhunderts, Japanische Holzschnitte, Aquarelle und Miniaturen des XII. bis XIX. Jahrhunderts, etc., etc. With 48 full-page plates. 589 items. Letteratura Italiana, Libri Antichi, Classici, Bibliografia, Letteratura Popolare, etc., etc. 1632 items. No. 731. No. 732. Catalogue of the Second-hand Books on the History of Leipzig. K. W. Hiersemann, Konigstrasse 29. No. 569. Memoiren, Germany. Leipzic. K. W. Hiersemen, Konigstrasse 29. No. 570. Klassische Philologie Archäologie, comprising Scriptores Graeci and Latini, Encyklopädie, Grammatik, Epigraphik, etc., etc. 2361 items. No. 571. Numismatik classified under the following heads: Antike, Mittelalter and Neuzeit, Amerika, Orient, etc., etc. 664 items. No. 572. Americana. A Collection of Rare and Valuable Books relating to South and North America, from the time of the Discovery up to the year 1865. With 23 illustrations. 472 items. Holland. Amsterdam. International Antiquariaat (M. Hertzberger), Singel 364. No. 38. Catalogue of Incunabula, Manuscripts, 16th Century Books, Bibliography, Printing, Fine Arts, Voyages, Modern Fine Printing Books on vellum, Natural History, etc. 696 items, with illustrations. Italy Florence. Davis & Orioli, 6 Lungarno Corsini. No. 23. Catalogue of Old and Rare Books, including works from Sixteenth Century Presses, Americana, books on Aristotle, Astronomy, Early Science, Geography, Italy, etc. 748 items. Switzerland. Basle. Rudolf Geering, Bäumleingasse 10. November, 1926. Basler Bucherfreund, containing Deutsche Literatur, Almanache, Gelegenheitsgraphik, Illustrierte Bucher, Alte Helvetica, Autographen, etc., etc. 913 items, with illustrations and many full-page plates. etc. No. 497. 1,488 items. Helvetica I. Die Kantone Basel, Bern, und Zurich, etc., No. 408. Antiquarian Books, including Biographien, Bilderbucher Anthologien und Ahnliches, Technologie, Memorien, Mythos und Sage, Sport, etc., etc. 1840 items. January, 1927. Catalogue of Books recently purchased, including Occulta, Curiosa, Architektur, Geographie, Mathematik, Nationalökonomie, Theologie, etc., etc. 1623 items. U.S.A. New York. Alwin J. Scheuer, 26, East 56th Street. No. 3. Books, Manuscripts, Autograph Letters and Drawings by famous illustrators. 1531 items, with numerous illustrations. Philadelphia. The Rosenbach Company, 1320, Walnut Street. A Catalogue of Autograph Letters and Documents relating to the Declaration of Independence and the Revolutionary War, issued in honor of the 150th Anniversary of the Signing of the Declaration. 231 items. BOOK-AUCTION RECORDS SUBSCRIPTION PRICE LIST. Current Volume: In 4 Quarterly Parts Or, with Cloth binding cases... ... Or with Exchange of Parts for cloth bound vol. for delivery Binding Case for any volume ... £1 12s. 6d. £1 14s. od. £110s. od. 2s. 6d. £3 3s. od. each I5s. od. £1 10s. od. £10 IOS. od. Back Volumes (all volumes from the commencement are obtain able in the original publisher's cloth): Vols. 1 to 16 (Vol. 1, is in 2 Parts, each 15s.) Vols. 17-23 The first 10 Volumes of B.A.R.," with Index [II vols.] All the above post free and strictly net. The Romantic Side of English Bookselling (continued) BY RICHARD HAGUE WE must pass on now to the year 1719, when the first part of the immortal Robinson Crusoe was published by W. Taylor, the founder, by the way, of the business now carried on by Longman's. It proved a great success, so much so that Taylor had to engage extra hands to cope with the demand. Three editions were sold in four months. Another famous publisher of the day was Bernard Lintot, who issued Gay's Wife of Bath and also his Trivia, but who is chiefly known as the publisher of Pope's works. Pope was paid £200 for each of the six volumes of the Iliad, and Johnson tells us that in the end he gained over £5,000 out of this work. Lintot, however, had bad luck in this venture, for a pirated edition was printed in Holland and imported and sold in England. After publishing the Dunciad, he retired and died in 1736, within two months of Tonson. It is a curious fact that these 18th century booksellers seem many of them to have been unfortunate in their physical appearance. Lines ascribed to Dryden refer thus to Tonson :— " With leering looks, bull-faced and freckled fair, And Pope, As when a dab-chick waddles through the copse With arms extended, Bernard (Lintot) rows his state Perhaps there was personal feeling at work, and it was not an age of literary delicacy. But Pope of all men should have known better. It was a glaring case of pot and kettle. We come now to the days of Dr. Johnson and his circle, when the man of the hour in the book world was Robert Dodsley. Dodsley started his career, with the help of a present from Pope, in 1735. He had two partners, Lawton Gilliver and J. Brindley, and before Pope died in 1744 some of his later works were issued by these publishers. own it. Dodsley's great success must be largely ascribed to his great personality. He had a way with him, as the saying goes. Humility and sincerity were prominent among his virtues. He began life as a footman and he was never ashamed to He had a genius for friendship, and all his friends called him" Doddy." Among his early patrons were Chesterfield and Sir Robert Walpole. Presently the great Johnson himself found his way to Dodsley's Shop. He was himself the son of a bookseller and had a kindly feeling for the trade, though that did not blind him to their failings. Dodsley and Andrew Millar shared the honour of issuing Johnson's famous dictionary in 1755. They got nothing but glory, however, for it proved a financial failure. It was Dodsley also who published the anonymous first edition of Gray's Elegy, and that unlike the dictionary proved a best-seller, running into four editions in two months, to say nothing of several pirated ones. Gray had some odd idea that it was beneath the dignity of a gentleman to have dealings of a business kind with a mere bookseller, and refused to accept any payment. Mr. Dodsley did not feel called upon to argue the point. Later, however, Gray came to his senses and sold the copyright of some later works for forty guineas. His poems, The Bard and The Progress of Poetry were acquired by Walpole and with them he inaugurated his Strawberry Hill Press. In 1759 came Laurence Sterne, desiring Dodsley to publish Tristram Shandy, for which he asked £50. Dodsley was ready to publish but thought the price too high. They came to some agreement, though the actual terms are unknown. The book took London and York by storm and was such a success that Dodsley was now ready to pay £480 for a second edition. Provincial publishing was still in a very small way except for Glasgow and Dublin. In the latter city, where the copyright act was not in force, there was a large output of pirated editions of famous English works from the presses of a notorious set of rascals. They printed and sold, for instance nearly half of Richardson's Sir Charles Grandison before a single volume of it had appeared in England. From these editions the unfortunate authors received not a penny. Glasgow deserves special mention, for there the famous press of R. & A. Foulis was founded in 1741, and from it came some of the finest printing ever produced, work ranking with that of the Aldine, Elzevir, Bodoni and Baskerville presses. It is sad to relate that their great venture was a financial failure, their losses totalling over £6,000. In 1777 three publishers, Davies, Strahan and Cadell arranged to publish Johnson's Lives of the Poets. The Doctor asked two hundred guineas for the work and got it. If he had asked 1,000 or 1,500" says Malone," he could easily have got it, for they probably made £5,000 out of it in five years." In 1784 Johnson died, and with him may be said to have ended the golden age of English bookselling. There is just one other incident of the period worth recording. In 1777 Strahan nearly refused Blair's Sermons, but on the advice of Johnson he reconsidered the matter and gave £100 for them. It was a wise step for the result was that he was able to give Blair another £100 on the first edition, £300 for a second and £600 for a third. The next publisher of note was T. Cadell, who succeded Andrew Millar. He published the works of Adam Smith, beloved of economists, Blackstone's Commentaries, and Gibbon's Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire. The lastnamed especially was an enormous success. Everyone interested in books has heard of the Kilmarnock Burns, issued in 1786, at the price of 3s. It brought its author (20, a veritable godsend to him at that time. "I had been for some days he says, "skulking from covert to covert, under the terrors of a jail, as some ill-advised people had uncoupled the merciless pack of the law at my heels." In addition to the pecuniary benefit it brought him fame. He found himself the lion of Edinburgh society, and a second edition printed there in the following year produced between £500 and £600. To return to England, Cowper's publisher was Joseph Johnson, and his first venture was the collection known as the Olney Hymns, the joint work of himself and John Newton. Cowper is another instance of an author who began by having a profound contempt for the money side of authorship, but developing later a keeness which bordered upon greed. It was Johnson also who published Blake's poems, which were entirely ignored by his contemporaries. Coming to the opening years of the 19th century, we find John Lackington making a name for himself. He worked on the principle of small profits, quick returns, and also introduced, much to the disgust of his colleagues, the cash down system. He was ridiculed and disliked, but he made a fortune. Incidentally, he was the first man to handle remainders successfully. He was evidently rather what Arnold Bennett would call A Card. He used to drive about in a chariot, on the doors of which was painted the legend" Small profits do great things." Another successful remainder dealer was Thomas Tegg. In the great panic in the book trade in 1826 he bought most of Scott's works at 4d. a volume, reselling at a huge profit. He also bought 100,000 volumes of Murray's Family Library at Is. a volume and cleared over 100% profit on the deal. Once again, he secured Valpy's Delphin Classics, 162 volumes, and cleared the lot in about two years. |