nty years than ever
before. There was a renaissance of the ancient styles of decoration in
France, and the choice Grolier and Maioli patterns were revived with the
general applause of the lovers of fine books.

In vivid contrast to these lovely specimens of the binder's art, are
found innumerable bibliopegic horrors, on the shelves of countless
libraries, public and private. Among these are to be reckoned most law
books, clad in that dead monotony of ugliness, which Charles Dickens has
described as "that _under-done pie-crust_ cover, which is technically
known as law calf." There are other uncouth and unwholesome specimens
everywhere abroad, "whom Satan hath bound", to borrow Mr. Henry Stevens's
witty application of a well-known Scripture text. Such repellant
bindings are only fit to serve as models to be avoided by the librarian.

The binding that is executed by machinery is sometimes called "commercial
binding". It is also known as "edition binding", because the whole
edition of a book is bound in uniform style of cover. While the modern
figured cloth binding originated in England, it has had its fullest
development in the United States. Here, those ingenious and powerful
machines which execute every branch of the folding and forwarding of a
book, and even the finishing of the covers, with almost lightning speed,
were mostly invented and applied. Very vivid is the contrast between the
quiet, humdrum air of the old-fashioned bindery hand-work, and the
ceaseless clang and roar of the machinery which turns out thousands of
volumes in a day.

"Not as ours the books of old,
Things that steam can stamp and fold."

I believe that I failed to notice, among the varieties of material for
book-bindings heretofore enumerated, some of the rarer and more singular
styles. Thus, books have been bound in enamel, (richly variegated in
color) in Persian silk, in seal-skin, in the skin of the rabbit,
white-bear, crocodile, cat, dog, mole, tiger, otter, buffalo, wolf, and
even rattle-snake. A favorite modern leather for purses and satchels,
alligator-skin, has been also applied to the clothing of books. Many
eccentric fancies have been exemplified in book-binding, but the acme of
gruesome oddity has been reached by binding books in human skin, of which
many examples are on record. It is perhaps three centuries old, but the
first considerable instance of its use grew out of the horrors of the
French Revolution. In England, the