the rich or to the poor
book-collector that the romantic element chiefly or more powerfully
attaches itself. It has been our lot to enjoy the acquaintance of both
classes, and we hesitate to pronounce any decided opinion. There is
the unquestionable triumph of the man with a full purse or an
inexhaustible banking account, who has merely to resolve upon a
purchase or a series of purchases, and to write a cheque for the sum
total. He is no sooner recognised by the members of the trade as a
zealous enthusiast and a liberal paymaster, than offers arrive, and
continue to arrive, from all sides. He is not asked to take any
trouble; his library is an object of solicitude to everybody who has
anything to sell; the order on his bankers is all that his humble
servants desire. He finds himself, after the lapse of a decade or so,
the master of a splendid collection, without having once known what it
was to get disagreeably warm or anxious in the pursuit of a volume, to
deliberate whether he could afford to buy it, or to submit to the
ordeal of attending an auction, one of a motley throng in a fetid
atmosphere. All these trials he has been spared; he has collected with
kid gloves.

On the contrary, a good deal may be said in favour of the amateur of
moderate fortune, who by personal judgment slowly accumulates an
important and enviable assemblage of literary monuments, like the Rev.
Thomas Corser, who spent L9000 during a lifetime on books, which
realised L20,000, and would now bring thrice as much, and perhaps
even more; and in that of men such as Charles Lamb and Samuel Taylor
Coleridge, who had to pause before they laid out a few shillings in
this way. The history of Lamb's books is more humanly interesting than
the history of the Huth or Grenville library; as chattels or furniture
they were worthless; they were generally the poorest copies
imaginable; but if they did not cost money, they often cost thought;
they sometimes involved a sacrifice, if the price was in the high
altitude of a sovereign. In the case of Lamb, the sister's opinion was
sought, and the matter lay ever so long in abeyance before the final
decision was taken, and Lamb hastened to the shop, uncertain if he
might not be too late, if the person whom he saw emerging as he
entered might not have _his_ book in his pocket. Here was payment in
full for the prize; the coin handed to the vendor was nothing to it;
Lamb had laid out more than the value in many a sleeple