第 11 页

On the day of which I speak he had secured a volume of love-poemswhich the author had done his best to destroy, and he had gone tohis club and read all the funniest passages aloud to friends of theauthor, who was on the club committee. Ah, was this a kind action?In short, Blinton had filled up the cup of his iniquities, andnobody will be surprised to hear that he met the appropriatepunishment of his offence. Blinton had passed, on the whole, ahappy day, notwithstanding the error about the Elzevir. He dinedwell at his club, went home, slept well, and started next morningfor his office in the City, walking, as usual, and intending topursue the pleasures of the chase at all the book-stalls. At thevery first, in the Brompton Road, he saw a man turning over therubbish in the cheap box. Blinton stared at him, fancied he knewhim, thought he didn't, and then became a prey to the glittering eyeof the other. The Stranger, who wore the conventional cloak andslouched soft hat of Strangers, was apparently an accomplishedmesmerist, or thought-reader, or adept, or esoteric Buddhist. Heresembled Mr. Isaacs, Zanoni (in the novel of that name), Mendoza(in 'Codlingsby'), the soul-less man in 'A Strange Story,' Mr. Home,Mr. Irving Bishop, a Buddhist adept in the astral body, and mostother mysterious characters of history and fiction. Before hisAwful Will, Blinton's mere modern obstinacy shrank back like a childabashed. The Stranger glided to him and whispered, "Buy these."

"These" were a complete set of Auerbach's novels, in English, which,I need not say, Blinton would never have dreamt of purchasing had hebeen left to his own devices.

"Buy these!" repeated the Adept, or whatever he was, in a cruelwhisper. Paying the sum demanded, and trailing his vast load ofGerman romance, poor Blinton followed the fiend.

They reached a stall where, amongst much trash, Glatigny's 'Jour del'An d'un Vagabond' was exposed.

"Look," said Blinton, "there is a book I have wanted some time.Glatignys are getting rather scarce, and it is an amusing trifle."

" Nay, buy THAT," said the implacable Stranger, pointing with ahooked forefinger at Alison's 'History of Europe' in an indefinitenumber of volumes. Blinton shuddered.

"What, buy THAT, and why? In heaven's name, what could I do withit?"

"Buy it," repeated the persecutor, "and THAT" (indicating the'Ilios' of Dr. Schliemann, a bulky work), "and THESE" (pointing toall Mr. Theodore Alois Buckley's translations of the Classics), "andTHESE" (glancing at the collected writings of the late Mr. HainFriswell, and at a 'Life,' in more than one volume, of Mr.Gladstone).

The miserable Blinton paid, and trudged along carrying the bargainsunder his arm. Now one book fell out, now another dropped by theway. Sometimes a portion of Alison came ponderously to earth;sometimes the 'Gentle Life' sunk resignedly to the ground. TheAdept kept picking them up again, and packing them under the arms ofthe weary Blinton.

The victim now attempted to put on an air of geniality, and tried toenter into conversation with his tormentor.

"He DOES know about books," thought Blinton, "and he must have aweak spot somewhere."

So the wretched amateur made play in his best conversational style.He talked of bindings, of Maioli, of Grolier, of De Thou, of Derome,of Clovis Eve, of Roger Payne, of Trautz, and eke of Bauzonnet. Hediscoursed of first editions, of black letter, and even ofillustrations and vignettes. He approached the topic of Bibles, buthere his tyrant, with a fierce yet timid glance, interrupted him.

"Buy those!" he hissed through his teeth.

"Those" were the complete publications of the Folk Lore Society.

Blinton did not care for folk lore (very bad men never do), but hehad to act as he was told.

Then, without pause or remorse, he was charged to acquire the'Ethics' of Aristotle, in the agreeable versions of Williams andChase. Next he secured 'Strathmore,' 'Chandos,' 'Under Two Flags,'and 'Two Little Wooden Shoes,' and several dozens more of Ouida'snovels. The next stall was entirely filled with school-books, oldgeographies, Livys, Delectuses, Arnold's 'Greek Exercises,'Ollendorffs, and what not.

"Buy them all," hissed the fiend. He seized whole boxes and piledthem on Blinton's head.

He tied up Ouida's novels, in two parcels, with string, and fastenedeach to one of the buttons above the tails of Blinton's coat.

"You are tired?" asked the tormentor. "Never mind, these books willsoon be off your hands."

So speaking, the Stranger, with amazing speed, hurried Blinton backthrough Holywell Street, along the Strand, and up to Piccadilly,stopping at last at the door of Blinton's famous and very expensivebinder.

The binder opened his eyes, as well he might, at the vision ofBlinton's treasures. Then the miserable Blinton found himself, asit were automatically and without any exercise of his will, speakingthus:-

"Here are some things I have picked up,--extremely rare,--and youwill oblige me by binding them in your best manner, regardless ofexpense. Morocco, of course; crushed levant morocco, double, everybook of them, petits fers, my crest and coat of arms, plenty ofgilding. Spare no cost. Don't keep me waiting, as you generallydo;" for indeed book-binders are the most dilatory of the humanspecies.

Before the astonished binder could ask the most necessary questions,Blinton's tormentor had hurried that amateur out of the room.

"Come on to the sale," he cried.

"What sale?" said Blinton.

"Why, the Beckford sale; it is the thirteenth day, a lucky day."

"But I have forgotten my catalogue."

"Where is it?"

"In the third shelf from the top, on the right-hand side of theebony book-case at home."

The stranger stretched out his arm, which swiftly elongated itselftill the hand disappeared from view round the corner. In a momentthe hand returned with the catalogue. The pair sped on to Messrs.Sotheby's auction-rooms in Wellington Street. Every one knows theappearance of a great book-sale. The long table, surrounded byeager bidders, resembles from a little distance a roulette table,and communicates the same sort of excitement. The amateur is at aloss to know how to conduct himself. If he bids in his own personsome bookseller will outbid him, partly because the booksellerknows, after all, he knows little about books, and suspects that theamateur may, in this case, know more. Besides, professionals alwaysdislike amateurs, and, in this game, they have a very greatadvantage. Blinton knew all this, and was in the habit of givinghis commissions to a broker. But now he felt (and very naturally)as if a demon had entered into him. 'Tirante il BiancoValorosissimo Cavaliere' was being competed for, an excessively rareromance of chivalry, in magnificent red Venetian morocco, fromCanevari's library. The book is one of the rarest of the VenetianPress, and beautifully adorned with Canevari's device,--a simple andelegant affair in gold and colours. "Apollo is driving his chariotacross the green waves towards the rock, on which winged Pegasus ispawing the ground," though why this action of a horse should becalled "pawing" (the animal notoriously not possessing paws) it ishard to say. Round this graceful design is the inscription [Greektext] (straight not crooked). In his ordinary mood Blinton couldonly have admired 'Tirante il Bianco' from a distance. But now, thedemon inspiring him, he rushed into the lists, and challenged thegreat Mr. -, the Napoleon of bookselling. The price had alreadyreached five hundred pounds.

"Six hundred," cried Blinton.

"Guineas," said the great Mr. -.

"Seven hundred," screamed Blinton.

"Guineas," replied the other.

This arithmetical dialogue went on till even Mr. -- struck his flag,with a sigh, when the maddened Blinton had said "Six thousand." Thecheers of the audience rewarded the largest bid ever made for anybook. As if he had not done enough, the Stranger now impelledBlinton to contend with Mr. -- for every expensive work thatappeared. The audience naturally fancied that Blinton was in theearlier stage of softening of the brain, when a man conceiveshimself to have inherited boundless wealth, and is determined tolive up to it. The hammer fell for the last time. Blinton owedsome fifty thousand pounds, and exclaimed audibly, as the influenceof the fiend died out, "I am a ruined man."

"Then your books must be sold," cried the Stranger, and, leaping ona chair, he addressed the audience:-

"Gentlemen, I invite you to Mr. Blinton's sale, which willimmediately take place. The collection contains some veryremarkable early English poets, many first editions of the Frenchclassics, most of the rarer Aldines, and a singular assortment ofAmericana."

In a moment, as if by magic, the shelves round the room were filledwith Blinton's books, all tied up in big lots of some thirty volumeseach. His early Molieres were fastened to old French dictionariesand school-books. His Shakespeare quartos were in the same lot withtattered railway novels. His copy (almost unique) of RichardBarnfield's much too 'Affectionate Shepheard' was coupled with oddvolumes of 'Chips from a German Workshop' and a cheap, imperfectexample of 'Tom Brown's School-Days.' Hookes's 'Amanda' was at thebottom of a lot of American devotional works, where it kept companywith an Elzevir Tacitus and the Aldine 'Hypnerotomachia.' Theauctioneer put up lot after lot, and Blinton plainly saw that thewhole affair was a "knock-out." His most treasured spoils wereparted with at the price of waste paper. It is an awful thing to bepresent at one's own sale. No man would bid above a few shillings.Well did Blinton know that after the knock-out the plunder would beshared among the grinning bidders. At last his 'Adonais,' uncut,bound by Lortic, went, in company with some old 'Bradshaws,' the'Court Guide' of 1881, and an odd volume of the 'Sunday at Home,'for sixpence. The Stranger smiled a smile of peculiar malignity.Blinton leaped up to protest; the room seemed to shake around him,but words would not come to his lips.

Then he heard a familiar voice observe, as a familiar grasp shookhis shoulder,--

"Tom, Tom, what a nightmare you are enjoying!"

He was in his own arm-chair, where he had fallen asleep afterdinner, and Mrs. Blinton was doing her best to arouse him from hisawful vision. Beside him lay 'L'Enfer du Bibliophile, vu et decritpar Charles Asselineau.' (Paris: Tardieu, MDCCCLX.)

If this were an ordinary tract, I should have to tell how Blinton'seyes were opened, how he gave up book-collecting, and took togardening, or politics, or something of that sort. But truthcompels me to admit that Blinton's repentance had vanished by theend of the week, when he was discovered marking M. Claudin'scatalogue, surreptitiously, before breakfast. Thus, indeed, end allour remorses. "Lancelot falls to his own love again," as in theromance. Much, and justly, as theologians decry a death-bedrepentance, it is, perhaps, the only repentance that we do notrepent of. All others leave us ready, when occasion comes, to fallto our old love again; and may that love never be worse than thetaste for old books! Once a collector, always a collector. Moi quiparle, I have sinned, and struggled, and fallen. I have throwncatalogues, unopened, into the waste-paper basket. I have withheldmy feet from the paths that lead to Sotheby's and to Puttick's. Ihave crossed the street to avoid a book-stall. In fact, like theprophet Nicholas, "I have been known to be steady for weeks at atime." And then the fatal moment of temptation has arrived, and Ihave succumbed to the soft seductions of Eisen, or Cochin, or an oldbook on Angling. Probably Grolier was thinking of such weaknesseswhen he chose his devices Tanquam Ventus, and quisque suos patimurManes. Like the wind we are blown about, and, like the people inthe AEneid, we are obliged to suffer the consequences of our ownextravagance.

BALLADE OF THE UNATTAINABLE

The Books I cannot hope to buy,Their phantoms round me waltz and wheel,They pass before the dreaming eye,Ere Sleep the dreaming eye can seal.A kind of literary reelThey dance; how fair the bindings shine!Prose cannot tell them what I feel,--The Books that never can be mine!

There frisk Editions rare and shy,Morocco clad from head to heel;Shakspearian quartos; ComedyAs first she flashed from Richard Steele;And quaint De Foe on Mrs. Veal;And, lord of landing net and line,Old Izaak with his fishing creel,--The Books that never can be mine!

Incunables! for you I sigh,Black letter, at thy founts I kneel,Old tales of Perrault's nursery,For you I'd go without a meal!For Books wherein did Aldus dealAnd rare Galliot du Pre I pine.The watches of the night revealThe Books that never can be mine!

ENVOY.

Prince, bear a hopeless Bard's appeal;Reverse the rules of Mine and Thine;Make it legitimate to stealThe Books that never can be mine!

LADY BOOK-LOVERS

The biographer of Mrs. Aphra Behn refutes the vulgar error that "aDutchman cannot love." Whether or not a lady can love books is aquestion that may not be so readily settled. Mr. Ernest QuentinBauchart has contributed to the discussion of this problem bypublishing a bibliography, in two quarto volumes, of books whichhave been in the libraries of famous beauties of old, queens andprincesses of France. There can be no doubt that these ladies werepossessors of exquisite printed books and manuscripts wonderfullybound, but it remains uncertain whether the owners, as a rule, werebibliophiles; whether their hearts were with their treasures.Incredible as it may seem to us now, literature was highly respectedin the past, and was even fashionable. Poets were in favour atcourt, and Fashion decided that the great must possess books, andnot only books, but books produced in the utmost perfection of art,and bound with all the skill at the disposal of Clovis Eve, andPadeloup, and Duseuil. Therefore, as Fashion gave her commands, wecannot hastily affirm that the ladies who obeyed were really book-lovers. In our more polite age, Fashion has decreed that ladiesshall smoke, and bet, and romp, but it would be premature to assertthat all ladies who do their duty in these matters are born romps,or have an unaffected liking for cigarettes. History, however,maintains that many of the renowned dames whose books are now themost treasured of literary relics were actually inclined to study aswell as to pleasure, like Marguerite de Valois and the Comtesse deVerrue, and even Madame de Pompadour. Probably books and arts weremore to this lady's liking than the diversions by which she beguiledthe tedium of Louis XV.; and many a time she would rather have beenquiet with her plays and novels than engaged in conscientiouslyconducted but distasteful revels.