16614 KD 61655 HARVARD PRINTED BY BALLANTYNE, HANSON AND CO. ΤΟ GEORGE AUGUSTUS SALA, CRITIC AND CONNOISSEUR, This Volume, ON A SUBJECT CONGENIAL TO HIS TASTES, IS INSCRIBED BY HIS FRIEND THE AUTHOR. WITHIN the last few years there has been a revival of the old and elegant taste of the book-fancier, as well as of that passion or faith which is described with such amiable enthusiasm in the little tract of the worthy Bishop Richard of Bury. The history and pedigree of books, of printers, &c., has always been a favourite study with the learned, attested by the profound and scholarly treatises of the Panzers, Hains, De Bures, Brunets, and our own Lowndes. But this subject has its popular graces also, and there is a sort of romantic interest attached to all that is associated with books-the rare old edition, the old printer, the blear-eyed collector, the binder, the sale, and the stray survivor of a whole edition, by some miracle preserved to our time. These topics seemed to kindle such writers as the late Dr. Hill Burton-perhaps the first in our time to deal popularly with such matters; Mr. Andrew Lang being the latest to illustrate this subject from his abundant stores |