n Mr. James West's and
Mr. John Ratcliffe's collections, I should say that the
former was more extensive, the latter more curious: Mr.
West's, like a magnificent _champagne_, executed by the hand
of Claude or Both, and enclosing mountains, and meadows, and
streams, presented to the eye of the beholder a scene at
once extensive, luxuriant, and fruitful: Mr. Ratcliffe's,
like one of those delicious pieces of scenery, touched by
the pencil of Rysdael or Hobbima, exhibited to the
beholder's eye a spot equally interesting, but less varied
and extensive. The sweeping foliage and rich pasture of the
former could not, perhaps, afford greater gratification than
did the thatched cottage, abrupt declivities, and gushing
streams of the latter. To change the metaphor--Mr. West's
was a magnificent repository, Mr. Ratcliffe's a choice
cabinet of gems.]

Thirty years have been considered by Addison (somewhere in his
Spectator) as a pretty accurate period for the passing away of one
generation and the coming on of another. We have brought down our
researches to within a similar period of the present times; but, as
Addison has not made out the proofs of such assertion, and as many of
the relatives and friends of those who have fallen victims to the
BIBLIOMANIA, since the days of Ratcliffe, may yet be alive; moreover,
as it is the part of humanity not to tear open wounds which have been
just closed, or awaken painful sensibilities which have been well nigh
laid to rest; so, my dear Sir, in giving you a further account of this
fatal disorder, I deem it the most prudent method _not to expatiate_
upon the subsequent examples of its mortality. We can only mourn over
such names as BEAUCLERK, CROFTS, PEARSON, LORT, MASON, FARMER,
STEEVENS, WOODHOUSE, BRAND, and REED! and fondly hope that the list
may not be increased by those of living characters!

We are, in the SECOND place, to describe the SYMPTOMS OF THE DISEASE.

The ingenious Peignot, in the first volume of his 'Dictionnaire
Bibliologie,' p. 51, defines the Bibliomania[48] to be "a passion for
possessing books; not so much to be instructed by them, as to gratify
the eye by looking on them. He who is affected by this mania knows
books only by their titles and dates, and is rather seduced by the
exterior than interior"! This is, perhaps, too general and vague a
definition to be of much benefit in the knowledge, a