-elaborated German style never seems to have affected
neighbouring countries; but since it was undoubtedly from Germany that
was spread the fashion of ornamental book-plates as marks of possession,
the history of German _ex-libris_ remains on that account one of high
interest to all those who are curious in the matter.

[Illustration: FIG. 3.--Book-plate of Lazarus Spengler, by Albrecht
Durer, 1515 (reduced).]

It was not before the 17th century that the _movable ex-libris_ became
tolerably common in France. Up to that time the more luxurious habit of
stamping the cover with a personal device had been in such general
favour with book-owners as to render the use of labels superfluous. From
the middle of the century, however, the _ex-libris_ proper became quite
naturalized; examples of that period are very numerous, and, as a rule,
are very handsome. It may be here pointed out that the expression
_ex-libris_, used as a substantive, which is now the recognized term for
book-plate everywhere on the continent, found its origin in France. The
words only occur in the personal tokens of other nationalities long
after they had become a recognized inscription on French labels.

In many ways the consideration of the English book-plate, in its
numerous styles, from the late Elizabethan to the late Victorian period,
is peculiarly interesting. In all its varieties it reflects with great
fidelity the prevailing taste in decorative art at different epochs. Of
English examples, none thus far seems to have been discovered of older
date than the gift-plate of Sir Nicholas Bacon; for the celebrated,
gorgeous, hand-painted armorial device attached to a folio that once
belonged to Henry VIII., and now reposes in the King's library, British
Museum, does not come under the head of book-plate in its modern sense.
The next is that of Sir Thomas Tresham, dated 1585. Until the last
quarter of the 17th century the number of authentic English plates is
very limited. Their composition is always remarkably simple, and
displays nothing of the German elaborateness. They are as a rule very
plainly armorial, and the decoration is usually limited to a symmetrical
arrangement of mantling, with an occasional display of palms or wreaths.
Soon after the Restoration, however, a book-plate seems to have suddenly
become an established accessory to most well-ordered libraries.
Book-plates of that period offer very distinctive characteristics. In
the simplicity o