238
NOTES AND QUERIES. LU s. x. S*PT. 19, ww.
on
Fine Old Bindings. By Edward Almack. (Blades,
East & Blades, 3Z. 3s.)
OF this handsome elephant folio only 200 copies have been printed, our review copy being No. 19. All that paper, print, and binding could do to make the work perfect in production has been done by the eminent printers to secure to the author a permanent record of the old bindings in his library.
"We agree with Mr. Almack in his love for the original bindings of old books, and " that a great number of copies of old books have lost some of their interest because many collectors for instance, Huth, both father and son never tried to preserve the original binding, and it is only recently that the American collectors have given attention to it ; hitherto they only hurried the book into a fine new binding." It is strange that while books originally in old calf or russia are frequently rebound, more modern first editions are sought for in their original cloth or boards, and the fact of their being handsomely bound detracts from their value.
By means of this work Mr. Almack designs to effect two objects : first, to supply information from actual experience which may aid in promot- ing the proper care of books ; and secondly, to give full-page Griggs' facsimiles of fine speci- mens of British bindings, most of them by Samuel Mearne, whom he " does not hesitate to describe as excelling any foreign binder." He refers to the history of Mearne written by Mr. Davenport for the Caxton Club of Chicago. To Mr. Almack a book appeals as "something teeming with life, energy, and heart," and when he takes from a bookcase a volume, tract, or broadside, it calls forth " innumerable interesting pictures and ques- tions such as clamour for reply."
In the letterpress he takes us round his library, shows us some of his treasures, gives bright descriptions of their contents, and now and then tells us when and how he got them. A query respecting one manuscript, " Meditations in Three Centuries, by H. Tubbe, M.A., sometime of St. John's Colledge in Cambridge," appeared in 'N. & Q.' on the 2nd of November, 1861, and to it the Editor appended -the following : " We hope our correspondent's query may elicit some particulars of Henry Tubbe, loyalist and poet. His prose and poetical pieces in the Harl. MS. 4126 are highly interesting and well worth printing. They consist of Epistles in prose and verse ; Two Books of Elegies ; Hymns ; Epistles translated ; Odes ; Satires ; Characters ; Epigrams ; Epistolae ad familiares ; and Devo- tions, in three centuries. In 1648 he was residing at Essex House ; and from 1652 to 1654 at Hoth- field in Kent, where he appears to have ended his days. We cannot discover whether he was in orders." We have given this extract in full, as it shows with what care our beloved predecessor edited the paper he founded. Mr. Almack has made a mistake in his name : it was Thorns, not Thomas."
Amongthe illustrations are the Book of Common Prayer, 1680, bound for Charles II. by Samuel Mearne ; Bible, 1650 ; Sherlock's ' Discourse
on Death,' 1690, bound by Charles Mearne ;
Archbishop Parker's copy of the Apocrypha,
1559, printed and bound for him in his own.
house ; and Charles II.'s copy of ' Eikon Basilike/
bound in black morocco by Mearne, black end-
leaves, the edges gold one way and black the
other. "' Pasted in the middle of the front cover,
doubtless arranged by the King, is an oval engrav-
ing of his father, and on the back cover a similar
engraving of himself, each portrait being framed
by Mearne with some of his extremely delicate
tooling, and executed after the prints had been
pasted in." There is also a facsimile of one of
the rare authentic portraits of Mary, Queen of
Scots. It forms one of the illustrations in John
Lesley's ' De Origine, Moribus, et Rebus Gestis
Scotorum,' which was published at Rome during'
his stay there in 1578.
An interesting relic of the old-book trade is a. facsimile of Quaritch's ' Cheap Book Circular,* offering books for cash at reduced prices. By the side of this, in Quaritch's handwriting, are the words, " with a considerable reduction to the trade." This is dated from 16, Castle Street, Leicester Square (one door from St. Martin's Court). We well remember Quaritch in that little shop with its board outside. He was often at the door, looking out for buyers. Under the stall was a grating giving light to an underground kitchen, where he would have his modest dinner. It was a great move from there to Piccadilly, where he still retained his homely habits.
Coming to quite modern times, we must men- tion a facsimile of a cover of a Bible printed at the Oxford Press, 1908, and bound by a young lady of twelve (Miss G. E. C. Almack) for her baby brother. It depicts a child praying. Evidently Mr. Almack has those at home in sympathy with him.
Calendar ol letters, Despatches, and State Papers* relating to the Negotiations bchceen England and Spain, preserved in the Archives at Vienna r Brussels, Simancas, and Elseichere. Vol. X. Edward VI. 1550-1552. Edited by Royall Tyler. (Stationery Office.)
THE greater part of this volume consists of the dispatches of Imperial Ambassadors in France and England to the Emperor Charles V. and to his sister, the Queen Dowager of Hungary, then governing the Low Countries. Simon Renard was Charles's representative at the Court of Henry II., and his terse, lively, and able letters relate the proceedings at the papal election, the circumstances of the English surrender, or rather sale, of Boulogne, and then the overtures of friendship made by Henry to England, with a view to the safer prosecution of war with the Emperor. Renard seldom uses his pen for purposes of mere description, but he gives, in his letter of 5 Oct., 1550, from Rouen, a vivid account of the pageantry accompanying the King's entry into that city, upon the termination of the Boulogne business. It is he, also, who tells the extraordinary story of Edward VI. 's having " plucked a falcon, which he kept in his private chamber, and torn it into four pieces, saying as he did so to his governors that he likened himself to the falcon, whom every one plucked ; but that he would pluck them too, thereafter, and tear them in four parts."
