e placed by the side
of the total which his collection of books brought after his death, no
more convincing arguments in favour of book-hunting could possibly be
needed. Bindley is the 'Leontes' of Dibdin's 'Bibliographical
Decameron,' and his collection of poetical rarities of the sixteenth and
seventeenth centuries was one of the most remarkable which had ever been
got together. Not many of the items had cost him more than a few
shillings each, and they realized almost as many pounds as he had paid
shillings. Perry was a journalist first and a book-collector afterwards,
but in many respects there was a great similarity in the tastes of the
two rival bibliophiles. Perry's was the more extensive collection--it
was sold in four parts, 1822-23--and perhaps on the whole much more
generally interesting. Evans, the auctioneer, described it as 'an
extraordinary assemblage of curious books, Early English poetry, old
tracts and miscellaneous literature.' The _cheval de bataille_ of the
fourth part consisted of 'a most Curious, Interesting and
Extraordinarily Extensive Assemblage of Political and Historical
Pamphlets of the Last and Present Century.' This collection was
comprised in thirty-five bundles. Perry made a speciality of facetiae,
pamphlets on the French Revolution, and Defoe's works, but the two
cornerstones of his library were a copy of the Mazarin Bible and a First
Folio Shakespeare.

Among the many book-collectors whose careers link the past century with
the present, few are more worthy of notice than Francis Douce, who died
in the spring of 1834, aged seventy-seven. He was for a short time
Keeper of the MSS. in the British Museum. His fortune was much increased
by being left one of the residuary legatees of Nollekens, the
sculptor--to the extent, in fact, of L50,000. Dibdin, who was for many
years a near neighbour and intimate friend at Kensington, describes
Douce's library as 'eminently rich and curious . . . not a book but what
had its fly-leaf written upon. In short, no man ever lived so much with,
and so entirely for, his books as did he.' Douce is the Prospero of the
'Bibliomania.' His books he bequeathed to the Bodleian, and his MSS. to
the British Museum, the stipulation in the latter case being that they
are not to be opened until 1900! In manners and appearance Douce was
singular and strange, rough to strangers, but gentle and kind to those
who knew him intimately. He was of the old school as regards dress