e Althorp Library has been so
repeatedly told, from the time of its first librarian, the devil-hunting
Thomas Frognall Dibdin--whose flatulent and sycophantic records are not
to be taken as mirroring the infinitely superior intellect and taste of
his employer--down to the present day, that any further description is
almost superfluous. Besides this, the library is one which will soon be
open to all. We may, however, mention a point which is of great
interest in the study of books as an investment. It may reasonably be
doubted whether the Althorp Library cost its founder much over L100,000;
it is generally understood that the price paid for it in 1892 was not
far short of L250,000.

[Illustration: _John, Duke of Roxburghe, Book-collector._]

Contemporaneously with the formation of the Althorp Collection, the Duke
of Roxburghe built a library, which was one of the finest and most
perfect ever got together. The Duke turned book-hunter through a love
affair, it is said. He was to have been married to the eldest daughter
of the Duke of Mecklenburg-Strelitz; but when this lady's sister was
selected as a wife for George III., the proposed marriage was deemed
impolitic, and consequently the Duke remained single. The Duke himself
is said to have traced his passion for books to the famous dinner given
by his father, the second Duke, at which Lords Oxford and Sunderland
were present, and at which the celebrated copy of the Valdarfer
Boccaccio was produced. The history of this incident is told in our
chapter on Book-sales, and need not be here more specifically referred
to. The Duke was a mighty hunter, not only of books, but of deer and
wild swans. So far as books are concerned, his great specialities were
Old English literature, Italian poetry, and romances of the Round Table;
and as the first and last of these have increased in value as years have
gone by, it will be seen that the Duke was wise in his generation.
Indeed, we have it on the best authority that the aggregate outlay on
the Roxburghe Library did not exceed L4,000, whilst in the course of
little more than twenty years it produced over L23,397, the sale taking
place in June, 1812. The Duke of Roxburghe and Lord Spencer were not
averse to a little understanding of the nature of a 'knock-out,' for in
one of the Althorp Caxtons Lord Spencer has written: 'The Duke and I had
agreed not to oppose one another at the [George Mason] sale, but after
the book [a Caxton] was boug