BOOKS AND BIDDERS
Reading edition
PAGE OF THE GUTENBERG BIBLE, SHOWING THE TEN COMMANDMENTS
BOOKS AND BIDDERS
THE ADVENTURES OF A BIBLIOPHILE
BY
A. S. W. ROSENBACH
WITH ILLUSTRATIONS
BOSTON LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY 1927
Copyright, 1927, By A. S. W. Rosenbach
All rights reserved
Published November, 1927 Reprinted November, 1927
THE ATLANTIC MONTHLY PRESS PUBLICATIONS ARE PUBLISHED BY LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY IN ASSOCIATION WITH THE ATLANTIC MONTHLY COMPANY
PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
TO PHILIP H. ROSENBACH
FOREWORD
It is a pleasant duty to record my appreciation of the assistance rendered me in the writing of these articles by Miss Avery Strakosch (Mrs. W. K. Denham). It was she who, at the suggestion of the editors of the Saturday Evening Post, persuaded me to dictate the series of eight articles that appeared in the Post in the first part of 1927. The ninth was published in the Atlantic Monthly in October 1927.
I cannot tell how much I am indebted to her, not only for the form of the articles, but for a friendship that began with the first article and will continue, I trust, long after the last ceases to be read.
A. S. W. R.
CONTENTS
PAGE
I Talking of Old Books 3
II A Million Dollar Bookshelf 35
III Sold to Dr. R! 68
IV Some Literary Forgeries 98
V Among Old Manuscripts 134
VI American Children’s Books 179
VII Old Bibles 210
VIII Why America Buys England’s Books 243
IX The Collector’s Best Bet 264
Index 301
ILLUSTRATIONS
Page of the Gutenberg Bible, Showing the Ten Commandments Frontispiece
Moses Polock in His Bookshop 6
The Infant Bibliophile 10
Stan V. Henkels 12
Moses Polock 18
Grolier Binding 22
Original Manuscript of Keats’s Famous Sonnet to Haydon 41
From a Letter by Shelley Speaking of Keats 42
Bookroom at 1320 Walnut Street, Philadelphia 44
A. Edward Newton 46
Letter of Dr. Samuel Johnson to David Garrick 48
Bookroom at 273 Madison Avenue, New York 56
Page from Original Manuscript of Charles Lamb’s “The Triumph of the Whale” 62
Page from Original Manuscript of Handel’s “Messiah” 69
Page from Original Manuscript of Wagner’s “Die Meistersinger” 73
Book Auction at the Anderson Galleries, New York 76
Thomas E. Kirby on the Rostrum 80
“The Biblio-fiends”: Drawing by Oliver Herford for Dr. Rosenbach’s “Unpublishable Memoirs” 82
Sotheby’s Auction Room in London 84
Shakespeare Window at 1320 Walnut Street, Philadelphia 86
Original Manuscript of Oscar Wilde’s Sonnet “On the Sale by Auction of Keats’ Love Letters” 94
Christopher Morley 94
Letter of Keats to Fanny Brawne 96
Last Page of Letter Written by Cervantes 101
Original Drawing by Daumier of Don Quixote 102
From a Letter in the Autograph of George Washington 106
Page from a Letter of Thackeray to Mrs. Brookfield 110
Page from Original Manuscript of Oscar Wilde’s “Salomé” 113
Dedication of Oscar Wilde’s “The Sphinx” to Mrs. Patrick Campbell 115
Forgery of Shakespeare Manuscript by William Henry Ireland 123
Book Belonging to the Lord Chamberlain, of Whose Company Shakespeare Was a Member 126
Letter of Franklin from Philadelphia, 1775 135
Page of Franklin’s Work Book 138
Page from Original Manuscript of Conrad’s “Victory” 144
Page from Original Manuscript of Conrad’s “Lord Jim” 145
Only Uncut Shakespeare Quarto Known 147
Presentation Inscription to Elizabeth Boyle in “The Faerie Queene,” in the Autograph of Edmund Spenser 150
Original Manuscript of Walt Whitman’s “By Emerson’s Grave” 152
Page from Manuscript of Dickens’s “Pickwick Papers” 156
Owen D. Young 158
Dickens’s Rhyme to Mr. Hicks, Prefixed to the Manuscript of “Pickwick Papers” 159
Last Letter Written by Charles Dickens 160
“The Dying Clown”: Original Drawing by Robert Seymour for Dickens’s “Pickwick Papers” 160
Original Manuscript of Robert Burns’s Poem “Bannockburn” 162
Vault at 273 Madison Avenue, New York 164
Page from Original Manuscript of Mark Twain’s “Tom Sawyer Abroad” 165
Letter of Poe Submitting “Epimanes” to the “New England Magazine,” with Part of Manuscript 169
Page from Original Manuscript of Joyce’s “Ulysses” 171
Stanzas from Original Manuscript of “The Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám,” by Edward Fitzgerald 175
Manuscript Title Page of Hawthorne’s “Wonder Book” 180
Title Page of “Spiritual Milk for Boston Babes” 188
Wilberforce Eames 192
Title of “The Glass of Whiskey” 193
Two Pages from “The Infant’s Grammar” 200
Title Page of “The Uncle’s Present” 204
Page from “Peter Piper’s Practical Principles of Plain and Perfect Pronunciation” 208
First Page of Cicero, “De Officiis,” Printed on Vellum, Mainz, 1465 216
Belle da Costa Greene 218
Leaf from an English Biblical Manuscript of the Ninth Century 222
Carved and Polychromed Wooden Binding of the Liesborn Gospels 224
Leaf from Block Book, Fifteenth Century 227
Special Dedication Page to Sixtus IV, of Jenson’s Bible 232
Woodcut, “Judith and Holofernes,” from Caxton’s “Golden Legend” 233
“Jack Juggler,” 1555—the Only Copy Known 247
Page of the Original Manuscript of White’s “Natural History of Selborne” 251
Page from a Fourteenth-Century Manuscript of Thomas Occleve’s “Poems,” Showing a Portrait of Chaucer 252
Henry E. Huntington 254
A Chaucer Manuscript in Original Binding 256
Letter Signed with Initials of George (Beau) Brummell 258
The English Library in Dr. Rosenbach’s Home 260
Manuscript of Arnold Bennett’s Unpublished Play 262
Tea-Ship Broadside 266
Tankard Presented to George Washington by the Reverend Dr. Green 268
Engraved Title of Captain John Smith’s “History of Virginia” 278
First Map of New York City Engraved in America 282
George Washington’s Copy of “Proceedings of the Convention” 285
Letter Signed by Button Gwinnett, Bought for $51,000 286
Grant’s Telegram to Stanton Announcing the Surrender of Lee 298
BOOKS AND BIDDERS