y them,
Can like the owner's self enjoy them?--
But, hark! I hear the distant drum!
The day of Flodden Field is come.--
Adieu, dear Heber! Life and health,
And store of literary wealth.'

The number of volumes accumulated by Heber was enormous. He collected
manuscripts as well as printed books. At the time of his death he
possessed eight houses overflowing with books. At Hodnet he had built a
new library which he is said to have filled with volumes selected on
account of their fine condition; and so careful was he of these, that
occasionally he used to engage the whole of the inside places of the
coach for their conveyance from London. The walls of all the rooms and
passages of his house at Pimlico were lined with books; and another
house in York Street, Westminster, which he used as a depository for
newly purchased books, was literally crammed with them from the floors
to the ceilings. He had a library in the High Street, Oxford; an immense
collection at Paris, which was sold in the years 1834 to 1836; another
at Ghent, sold in 1835; and others at Brussels and Antwerp, together
with smaller gatherings in several places on the Continent. Dibdin
estimated the total number of volumes in Heber's collections in England
at one hundred and twenty-seven thousand five hundred, but other
calculations have placed it at a somewhat lower figure. The whole of the
libraries which he possessed in England and on the Continent probably
contained from one hundred and forty-five thousand to one hundred and
fifty thousand volumes, as well as a very large number of pamphlets; and
they are believed to have cost him about a hundred thousand pounds. As
Heber was an accomplished scholar as well as a collector, his books were
chosen with ability and judgment. He was a purchaser at every great
sale, and so keen was he in the prosecution of his favourite pursuit,
that on hearing of a rare book he has been known to undertake a coach
journey of several hundred miles to obtain it. His library was
particularly rich in the works of the early English poets, and his
collection of Greek and Latin Classics, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese and
French books was very extensive and choice, but he had a great objection
to large paper copies, because they occupied so much room on his
shelves. He possessed also a number of books printed in Mexico; and
among his manuscripts were to be found the letters and papers of Sir
Julius Caesar, the autograph manusc