English Book Collectors Part 21

Sir William t.i.te, C.B., was the son of Mr. Arthur t.i.te, a London merchant. He was born in London in 1798, and after receiving his education at private schools, became a pupil of David Laing, the architect of the Custom House. Sir William t.i.te designed many buildings in London and the provinces, and a considerable number of the more important railway stations; but the work with which his name is especially a.s.sociated was the rebuilding of the Royal Exchange, which cost 150,000, and was opened by the Queen on the 28th of October 1844.

In 1838 he was elected President of the Architectural Society, and of the Royal Inst.i.tute of British Architects from 1861-63, and from 1867-70. He entered Parliament in 1855 as Member for Bath, and continued to represent that const.i.tuency until his death. In 1869 he was knighted, and in the following year he received the Companionship of the Bath. Sir William was a Fellow of the Royal Society, and also of the Society of Antiquaries. He died at Torquay on April 20th, 1873, and was buried in Norwood Cemetery.

Sir William t.i.te was an ardent collector of ma.n.u.scripts, books, and works of art, and he formed a very large and choice library, which contained many valuable ma.n.u.scripts, and a great number of rare early English books. It was sold by Sotheby, Wilkinson and Hodge, in May and June 1874. The sale occupied sixteen days, and realised nineteen thousand nine hundred and forty-three pounds, six shillings. There were three thousand nine hundred and thirty-seven lots.

Among the more notable ma.n.u.scripts in the library were a richly illuminated _Lectionarium_, written on vellum about A.D. 1150 at the monastery of Ottenbeuren in Suabia, which sold for five hundred and fifty pounds; a Wycliffe New Testament on vellum of the first half of the fifteenth century, which brought two hundred and forty-one pounds; a copy of the Four Gospels of about the same period, which fetched one hundred and eight pounds; a number of Horae and other service books, and three devotional works written by Jarry, the famous French calligraphist. There were also the original ma.n.u.scripts of three of the novels of Sir Walter Scott--_Peveril of the Peak_, the first volume of the _Tales of my Landlord (The Black Dwarf)_, and _Woodstock_, which together realised three hundred and ninety-eight pounds. The collection also contained a block-book, _The Apocalypse_, which brought two hundred and eighty-five pounds; four Caxtons, the most important of which--a perfect copy of the second edition of the _Mirrour of the World_--sold for four hundred and fifty-five pounds; and many books from the presses of Machlinia, Pynson, Wynkyn de Worde, Notary, and other early English printers. Shakespeare was well represented. The first three folios were to be found in the library, as well as the first editions of _Lucrece_ and the _Sonnets_, and a large number of the quarto plays. The first folio and _Lucrece_ realised respectively four hundred and forty pounds and one hundred and ten pounds. There was also a choice collection of the works of other writers of the time of Elizabeth and James I. A copy of the first edition of _Don Quixote_; and a set of the first five editions of Walton's _Compleat Angler_, which sold for sixty-eight pounds, also deserve especial notice. A series of autographs in thirteen folio volumes realised three hundred and twenty-five pounds; and the sale catalogue contained as many as two hundred and fourteen lots of autograph letters of Mary Queen of Scots, Lord Bacon, Cromwell, and other celebrities.

Sir William t.i.te was the author of a 'Report of a Visit to the Estates of the Honourable Irish Society in Londonderry and Coleraine in the year 1834,' and of a 'Descriptive Catalogue of the Antiquities found in the Excavations at the New Royal Exchange,' which he published in 1848.

Several of his papers and addresses, which princ.i.p.ally treated of bibliographical or antiquarian subjects, were privately printed. He was a liberal promoter of all schemes for the advancement of education, and he founded the t.i.te Scholarship in the City of London School.

JAMES THOMSON GIBSON-CRAIG, 1799-1886

Mr. James Thomson Gibson-Craig, who was born in March 1799, was the second son of Mr. James Gibson, the political reformer, who, on succeeding under entail to the Riccarton estates in 1823, a.s.sumed the name of Craig, and in 1831 was created a baronet. He was educated at the High School and the University of Edinburgh, and after spending some time in foreign travel, he became a Writer to the Signet, and joined the firm afterwards known as Gibson-Craig, Dalziel and Brodies, of Edinburgh, of which he continued a member until about the year 1875. Mr.

Gibson-Craig was well known for his literary and antiquarian tastes, and it was princ.i.p.ally owing to his exertions that the Historical Ma.n.u.scripts of Scotland were reproduced and issued during the time his brother, Sir William Gibson-Craig, held the office of Lord Clerk Register. He was a friend of Sir Walter Scott, of Lord Jeffrey, and Lord c.o.c.kburn, and at a later period of Lord Macaulay; and he was also intimate with most of the princ.i.p.al Scottish artists and antiquaries of his time. He died at Edinburgh on the 18th of July 1886. Mr.

Gibson-Craig, who began to collect during his student days, formed an extensive and valuable library of choice books, many of which were bound by celebrated binders, and were once to be found in such famous libraries as those of Grolier, Canevari, Diana of Poitiers, Mary Queen of Scots, Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester, De Thou, Count von Hoym, Longepierre, and Madame de Pompadour. After his death his collection was sold by Sotheby, Wilkinson and Hodge in three portions. The first portion was sold on June the 27th, 1887, and nine following days; the second on March the 23rd, 1888, and five following days, and on April 6th and eight following days; and the third on November the 15th, 1888, and two following days. There were altogether nine thousand four hundred and four lots, and the amount realised was fifteen thousand five hundred and nine pounds, four shillings and sixpence.

The following are some of the more notable books and ma.n.u.scripts in the collection, and the prices obtained for them:--

_Bartholomaei Camerarii de Praedestinatione dialogi tres._ Parisiis, 1556.

Bound in white morocco, the sides blind-tooled with the various emblems of Diana of Poitiers, and the initial of Henry II., King of France, surmounted by a crown. In the centre of the upper cover are the words CONSEQVITVR QVOD CVNQVE PEt.i.t, and on the lower cover NIHIL AMPLIVS OPTAT. One hundred and forty-six pounds.

_Cronique de Savoye, par Maistre Guillaume Paradin._ Lyon, 1552. This volume formerly belonged to Mary Queen of Scots. It is in the original calf binding, and has in the centre of each cover a shield bearing the arms of Scotland, surmounted by a crown, with a crowned M above, below, and on each side of them, as well as at the corners of the book, and also on the panels of the back. Two hundred and sixty-five pounds.

_Larismetique et Geometrie de Estienne de la Roche._ Lyon, 1538. The binding bears the arms of James Hepburn, Earl of Bothwell, third husband of Mary Queen of Scots. Eighty-one pounds.

_The XIII. Bukes of Eneados, translated out of Latyne verses into Scottish metir bi Mayster Gawin Douglas, Bishop of Dunkel, and unkil to the Erie of Angus._ [W. Copland], London, 1553. Seventy-five pounds, ten shillings.

_Poliphili Hypnerotomachia._ Aldus, Venetiis, 1499. Ninety pounds.

_Tewrdannck._ Augsburg, 1519. Thirty-nine pounds.

Walton's _Compleat Angler_. First edition. London, 1653.

Cotton's _Complete Angler_. First edition. London, 1676. Together, one hundred and ninety-five pounds.

Burns's _Poems_. Kilmarnock, 1786. One hundred and eleven pounds.

The more important of the ma.n.u.scripts were:--

_Horae B. Mariae Virginis_, written in the thirteenth century on vellum by an Anglo-Saxon or Scottish scribe. Three hundred and twenty-five pounds.

The First and Second Series of Sir Walter Scott's _Chronicles of the Canongate_. An autograph ma.n.u.script presented by the author to R.

Cadell. One hundred and forty-one pounds.

A collection of valuable and interesting correspondence and memoranda relating to the Rebellion of 1715, comprising many of the original letters and despatches from the Earl of Mar, etc. Ninety-nine pounds.

In 1882 Mr. Gibson-Craig issued, in an edition of twenty-five copies, _Fac-similes of Old Book Binding_ in his collection; and in the following year a facsimile reprint of the _Shorte Summe of the whole Catechisme_, by his ancestor John Craig, accompanied by a memoir of the author by Thomas Graves Law, of the Signet Library. He also printed for the Bannatyne Club 'Papers relative to the marriage of King James the Sixth of Scotland with the Princess Anna of Denmark A.D. MDLx.x.xIX, and the Form and Manner of Her Majesty's Coronation at Holyroodhouse A.D.

MDXC.'

ALEXANDER WILLIAM, TWENTY-FIFTH EARL OF CRAWFORD, 1812-1880

It is about three hundred years since the founder of the Bibliotheca Lindesiana died. John Lindsay, the Octavian, better known by his t.i.tle of Lord Menmuir, the ancestor of the Earls of Balcarres, had a distinguished though but brief career. He was not quite forty-seven years old when he died. During his short though eventful life he took a leading part in State affairs, being much trusted by his Sovereign, King James VI. He was a man of varied talents--lawyer, statesman, man of business, scholar, man of letters, and a poet. He seems to have been familiar with Greek, and to have corresponded in the Latin language.

Besides these he acquired a knowledge of French, Italian and Spanish. He acc.u.mulated many State papers and letters from distinguished persons both at home and abroad.[101] These, now known as 'the Balcarres Papers,' were presented by Colin, Earl of Balcarres, to the Advocates'

Library in 1712. A summary account of them is given in the First Report of the Historical Ma.n.u.scripts Commission. Lord Menmuir's library is now represented at Haigh[102] by two volumes and three fragments, all of which bear his autograph. Lord Menmuir was succeeded by a son, who died whilst yet a youth and unmarried. The second son, David, who after his brother's death inherited the estate of Balcarres, may be termed the second founder of the library. The father's love of books and learning seems to have in a very large measure descended to the son. He added to the library until it became one of the best in the kingdom. A very charming letter from William Drummond of Hawthornden to David Lindsay, sent with a copy of the _Flowers of Zion_, which the poet had privately printed, is clear evidence of the terms on which Lindsay lived with his friends and fellow book-lovers. The original letter is preserved in the Muniment Room at Haigh, but the identical copy of Drummond's work has, alas! been lost sight of.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE SMALL BOOK-STAMP OF THE FIRST LORD BALCARRES.]

The library of Sir David Lindsay, Lord Balcarres, continued at the family seat on the sh.o.r.es of the Firth of Forth until comparatively recent times. Sibbald in 1710 mentions the 'great bibliothek' at Balcarres. In Sibbald's time the owner, Colin, third Earl of Balcarres, had added many books to the library, and spent the evening of his days in the pursuit of letters. When Lady Balcarres, great-grandmother of the present Earl of Crawford, left Fife and removed to Edinburgh, whilst her son was in the West Indies, the greater portion of the library was literally thrown away and dispersed--torn up for grocers as useless trash, by her permission. Of the library collected by generations of Lindsays, all that now remains is a handful of little over fifty volumes. The books of David Lindsay, first Lord Balcarres, who died in 1641, are recognisable from his signature, and on many of them his arms are impressed in gold on the sides.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE LARGE BOOK-STAMP OF THE FIRST LORD BALCARRES.]

Of the present library at Haigh, the nucleus of it may be said to be the books inherited by the grandfather of the present Earl, whose wife was the heiress of the first Baron Muncaster. These Muncaster books, although not of the greatest value, formed a basis on which the late Earl of Crawford, who was born in 1812, built up the present library, which will be always a.s.sociated with his memory. When a boy he was fired with enthusiasm for books, and determined to form a great library in which every branch of human knowledge in every language should have a place. He began collecting about 1826, shortly after going to Eton, and continued most a.s.siduously to gather of all that was best until his death in 1880. His success may be judged in some measure by the remarkable collections dispersed in 1887 and 1889, which together consisted of three thousand two hundred and fifty-four lots, and realised twenty-six thousand three hundred and ninety-seven pounds, fourteen shillings. Family burdens rendered it needful for the present possessor of the library to put his hands on some available a.s.sets, and this necessity coming at a period of great commercial depression, a portion of the literary treasures unfortunately suffered. But the work was again renewed, and the present state of the library will not compare ign.o.bly with its past. The number of ma.n.u.scripts is very considerable, probably about six thousand, not a few of which are of the greatest interest and value, many of them having covers of the precious metals or carved ivory, enriched with gems and crystals. There are also many papyri, a great number of Oriental ma.n.u.scripts, collections of French autograph letters of the Revolutionary and Napoleonic periods, and of English autograph letters. The printed books amount to about one hundred thousand, and among them are to be found several block-books and a large number of incunabula, including books printed by Caxton, Machlinia, Wynkyn de Worde, Pynson, Rood, and other early English printers. The library is particularly rich in the productions of the early Italian presses, especially those of Rome and Venice; and it also contains a fine collection of rare works on the languages of North and South America, many of them printed in Mexico and Lima, and a series of books printed in Aberdeen from 1622 to 1736. Of other printed matter there are collections of broadside ballads; broadside proclamations ill.u.s.trative of English, French, Dutch, German and Italian history; a long series of Papal Bulls; early English newspapers from 1631 to the Restoration; Civil War tracts; tracts by, for and against Martin Luther; newspapers and periodicals published during the various French revolutions; and a large number of caricatures issued in France and Germany during the Second Empire and the Commune.

It is not an easy task to pick out the choicest gems from the abundant treasures of this splendid collection, but the following are a few of the most interesting and valuable of the ma.n.u.scripts:

A Legal Instrument of Donation from Johannes, the Primicerius, or Captain of a company of soldiers, to the Church of Ravenna; written on papyrus, probably about A.D. 580-600, at Ravenna. Five feet four inches long by eleven and a half inches broad.

The Four Gospels in Syriac, in the original Pes.h.i.tto version, written on vellum about 550.

St. Cyprian, Bishop of Carthage, _Epistolae et Opuscula_, written in the seventh or eighth century in rude Merovingian characters, often mixed with uncial letters. One of the oldest ma.n.u.scripts in existence of this Father of the Church.

The Four Gospels in Latin, written about 850.

A Textus or Book of the Gospels, probably written at the Benedictine monastery of St. Gall, Switzerland, in the ninth or tenth century. In the centre of the upper cover, which is intended to be used as a pax at Ma.s.s, is an ivory panel of the Crucifixion, with figures of the Virgin Mary and St. John the Evangelist. The border is of gilt copper engraved with a floriated pattern, and studded with silver bosses and jewels; at the corners are Limoges enamel plaques with the four Evangelists. The ivory carving is of the tenth or eleventh century, the border early thirteenth.

The New Testament in Syriac: the Gospels of the Pes.h.i.tto version, and the remaining books of the Heraclean version, written about 1000.

Remarkable as being the only complete Syriac New Testament of any antiquity in any library in Europe.

The Old Testament in Latin, written by a German scribe in the eleventh century. The upper cover consists of a carved ivory panel of the thirteenth century, with a border of silver gilt, decorated with filigree work and figures in _repousse_, and enriched with crystals _en cabochon_.

St. Beatus, _Commentarius in Apocalypsim_, written in Spain about 1150; with one hundred and ten very large miniatures and a circular map of the world.

_Bible Historiee_, executed in the south of France about 1250; a series of full-page paintings on a background of burnished gold, representing scenes from the Book of Genesis.

_Psalterium_, written in Paris about 1260. This volume belonged at one time to Joan of Navarre, Queen Consort of Henry IV., King of England, whose autograph is on one of the blank leaves.

_Roman de la Rose_, written for, and presented to, Christina de Lindesay, Dame de Coucy, 1323.

_Rime di Petrarca et Canconi di Dante._ One of the most important ma.n.u.scripts of the two poets, written during the lifetime of Petrarch, or immediately after his death, by Paul the Scribe for Lorenzo, the son of Carlo degli Strozzi, a member of one of the n.o.blest families of Florence.