Book Plates Part 8

School-boys--and I dare say, if one could only learn the truth in such matters, school-girls too--have a habit of inscribing their school-books with verses, denouncing in decidedly forcible language the school-fellow who steals--_i.e._ borrows and forgets to return--any particular volume, and at the end of these verses is depicted a gallows from which hangs the lifeless body of the thief. When did school-boys first thus protect their possessions? Few school-books survive for use by many successive generations, so we have no means of answering the question satisfactorily; but in a book--not a school-book--published in 1540, there are written (so a correspondent of _Notes and Queries_ informs us), in writing more than three centuries old, these lines below the owner's signature:--

'My Master's name above you se, Take heede therefore you steale not mee; For if you doe, without delay Your necke ... for me shall pay.

Looke doune below and you shal see The picture of the gallowstree; Take heede therefore of thys in time, Lest on this tree you highly clime.'

[Drawing of the gallows.]

So the school-boy's doggerel is at least founded on an ancient model, which we have quoted, though not actually appearing on a book-plate, because it was clearly intended to do duty as one.

Of exactly the same date is a very pompous declaration, on a German book-plate, of a donor's intention that certain volumes given by him should remain for ever in the library to which they are presented. The owner of the book-plate was John Faber, Bishop of Vienna, who died in 1541, and who, in the previous year, presented his books to the College of St. Nicholas in that city. Here is a translation given by Lord De Tabley, in which mark how in kingly fas.h.i.+on the bishop refers to himself as 'we':--

'This book was bought by us, Dr. John Faber, Bishop of Vienna, and a.s.sistant in the Government of the New State, both as councillor and confessor to the most glorious, clement, and pious Ferdinand, King of the Romans, Hungary, and Bohemia, and Archduke of Austria. And since, indeed, that money (which purchased this volume) did not arise from the revenues and properties of our diocese, but from our own most honest labours in other directions. And therefore it is free to us to give or bequeath the book to whomsoever we please. We accordingly present it to our College of St. Nicholas. And we ordain that this volume shall remain there for ever for the use of the students, according to our order and decree. Done in our Episcopal Court at Vienna, on the first day of September in the year of Grace 1540.'

[Ill.u.s.tration]

Dr. Faber was famous for his orthodoxy and his fervour in enforcing it; so much so, that he earned for himself the t.i.tle _Malleus hereticorum_.

He does not trust himself to express his opinion of the too eager student who should take to himself a volume from amongst these books; which is perhaps well.

More polite than the English verses of 1540, and therefore not half so serviceable, are those printed on an actual book-plate, by which Andrew Hedio, a Konigsberg professor of philosophy, who lived about the middle of the seventeenth century, sought to insure the safe return to his library of any volume which was out on loan. The arms of Hedio--the head and shoulders of an old bearded man in a fish-tailed nightcap--appear on the book-plate, and below, supposed to be spoken by the volume, are Latin verses, which in free translation may be rendered:--

'By him who bought me for his own, I'm lent for reading leaf by leaf; If honest, you'll return the loan, If you retain me, you're a thief.'

If you turn back to p. 123 and look at the book-plate of Speratus, you will see that he had expressed very much this sentiment more than a century before.

It is not till the beginning of the eighteenth century that we find any decided expression of possession on an English book-plate. Then it occurs on that of John Reilly (described on p. 53). At the very bottom of the design is printed: 'Clamabunt omnes te, liber, esse meum.' Here you see it is John Reilly himself and not his book that speaks. It is a mild and decidedly gentlemanly way of expressing owners.h.i.+p, free from threats for not returning the volume; indeed, hardly contemplating the possibility of so dishonest an act.

About the same date as Reilly's book-plate is a very graceful German one, executed for Michael Lilienthal (figured on p. 165). It shows us a group of growing lilies, around which bees are hovering or tasting their sweetness, and below--

'Use the book, but let no one misuse it; The bee does not stain the lilies, but only touches them.'

From this graceful book-plate and the pleasantry of its inscription, we turn to a heavy declamatory sentence, devised, _circa_ 1730, by the librarian of the Benedictine monastery of Wessenbrun, in Bavaria, for the books in his charge to speak when a theft had been actually committed or was in contemplation: 'I am the rightful possession of the Cloister of Wessenbrun. Ho there! Restore me to my master, so right demands!'

Sherlock Willis, whose book-plate--a decided 'Chippendale'--is dated in 1756, flies to Scripture for his aid against immoral borrowers, and places on his book-plate the familiar quotation from the 37th Psalm: 'The unG.o.dly borroweth, and payeth not again.' Various other English book-plates bear the same quotation, or some other taken from the Bible.

On that in use at the Parochial Library of Tadcaster, which shows us St.

John in the isle of Patmos receiving from the angel the book which he was to eat, we read: 'Accipe librum et devora illum' (Rev. x. 9); advice which it was not, we may presume, intended that the borrower should follow literally.

There is something very businesslike and to the point about the inscription on the book-plate of Charles Ferdinand Hommeau, which is dated six years after that of Sherlock Willis. The inscription reads in translation: 'If you do not return the loan within fourteen days, or do not keep it carefully, on another occasion [when you ask to borrow it or some other book] I shall say I have not got it.' So M. Hommeau will not mind telling a lie to protect his library; and what is more, does not mind telling the world of his intention to do so. Truly he was an honest liar.

David Garrick (whose book-plate is figured opposite) selected as an appropriate quotation for his book-plate the following, taken from the fourth volume of _Menagiana_:--'La premiere chose qu'on doit faire quand on a emprunte un livre, c'est de le lire afin de pouvoir le rendre plutot.' Very good advice, no doubt; but I wonder if 'Davy' was careful enough to confine his loans to those who would follow it? This reminds me of a very nicely put pa.s.sage of Lord De Tabley's, _a propos_ of the subject of book-borrowing in general:--

[Ill.u.s.tration]

'Now this batch of mottoes raises the point, whether valuable books should be lent to persons who treat volumes like coal scuttles; who perpetrate such atrocities as moistening their thumbs to turn a page over; who hold a fine binding before a roaring fire? who, _horribile dictu_, read at breakfast, and use, as a book-marker, the b.u.t.ter-knife.

Ought Garrick to have lent the cream of his Shakespeare quartos to slovenly and mole-eyed Samuel Johnson? We think emphatically not! Many full-grown folks have no more idea of handling a book than has a school-boy.'

So far the 'caveats' on book-plates have been either original compositions or quotations, specially selected by the owner; but, as time went on, people did not trouble to compose their own verses or inscriptions, or to hunt up appropriate quotations. The same lines or words appear fastened beneath, or printed upon, the book-plates of many different persons; in the latter case the book-plate is generally little more than a name ticket. Here is one, composed early in this century, which could be bought of C. Talbot, at 174 Tooley Street, and on it the purchaser could write his name before affixing it in his volumes:--

'THIS BOOK BELONGS TO . . . . . . . .

If thou art borrowed by a friend, Right welcome shall he be To read, to study, not to lend, But to return to me.

Not that imparted knowledge doth Diminish learning's store; But Books, I find, if often lent, Return to me no more.

Read slowly, Pause frequently, Think seriously, Keep cleanly, return duly, With the corners of the leaves not turned down.'

Of about the same date is another little effusion, which clearly does not contemplate the purchaser being the possessor of a _unique_ volume, or of one for any cause irreplaceable, if lost:--

'THIS BOOK BELONGS TO

Neither blemish this book, nor the leaves double down, Nor lend it to each idle friend in the town; Return it when read, or, if lost, please supply Another as good to the mind and the eye.'

In these last quoted examples are certainly many stipulations, but they are as nought when compared with what we find on the book-plate of the Cavalier Francesco Vargas Macciucca, who was in the habit of pasting on the fly-leaf of the book, opposite his book-plate, _fifteen_ rules, written in Latin, to be observed by those who borrowed books from his library. If he enforced them, he can have been seldom troubled with a borrower!

On the face of them,--since most of them have a blank s.p.a.ce left for the owner's name, etc.,--these poetic or prosaic threats against book-stealers and the ill-usage of books do not pretend to be the compositions of those that used them. Jones or Brown went to the nearest stationer or bookseller, and purchased his admonitions all ready composed. But even after the introduction of ready-made admonitions, we find the man of independent mind rebelling against saving his library from spoliation by anybody's words save his own. Such a person was Mr.

Charles Clark, of Great Totham Hall, near Witham, in Ess.e.x, who can at least claim originality for his composition, which, if lengthy, has occasional gleams of humour. Here it is:--

'A PLEADER TO THE NEEDER WHEN A READER

As all, my friend, through wily knaves, full often suffer wrongs, Forget not, pray, when it you've read, to whom this book belongs.

Than one Charles Clark, of Totham Hall, none to 't a right hath better, A _wight_, that same, more _read_ than some in the lore of old _black_ letter; And as C. C. in _Ess.e.x_ dwells--a s.h.i.+re at which all laugh-- His books must sure less fit seem drest, if they're not bound in _calf_!

Care take, my friend, this book you ne'er with grease or dirt besmear it; While none but awkward _puppies_ will continue to "dog's-ear" it!

And o'er my books, when book-"worms" "grub," I'd have them understand, No marks the margin must de-_face_ from any busy "_hand_"!

Marks, as re-marks, in books of Clark's, whene'er some critic spy leaves, It always him so _waspish_ makes though they're but on the _fly_-leaves!

Yes, if so they're used, he'd not de-_fer_ to _deal_ a fate most meet-- He'd have the soiler of his _quires_ do penance in a _sheet_!

The Ettrick _Hogg_--ne'er deem'd a _bore_--his candid mind revealing, Declares, to beg a _copy_ now's a mere pre-_text_ for stealing!

So, as some knave to grant the loan of this my book may wish me, I thus my book-_plate_ here display lest some such _fry_ should _dish_ me!

But hold!--though I again declare with-holding I'll not brook, And "a _sea_ of trouble" still shall take to bring book-worms to "book."

'C. C.'

A certain Ches.h.i.+re clergyman, who died not very long since, sought euphony in a string of commands to intending borrowers, which he had printed on his book-plate; 'Borrow bravely; Keep carefully; Peruse patiently; Return righteously.' What a pity he did not spell 'carefully'

with a 'k' whilst he was about it!

The Plymouth architect and author, George Wightwick, or, as he evidently p.r.o.nounced it, _Witick_, used to affix in his books:--

'To whomsoever this book I _lend_ I _give_ one word--no more; They who to _borrow_ condescend Should graciously _restore_.

And whosoe'er this book should find (Be't trunk-maker or critick), I'll thank him if he'll bear in mind That it is mine, GEORGE WIGHTWICK.'

See, too, how a certain Mr. Charles Woodward protected, or thought he protected, the volumes which good nature may have prompted him to lend.

His plate shows an opened volume, on one page of which is written: 'Narrative--promising to send me home at the appointed time. Finis.'

Evidently Mr. Woodward, like the honest liar before mentioned, was not a man to lend his volumes for an indefinite period.

Having quoted various recent English examples of this kind, we are in duty bound to cite some from other component parts of the United Kingdom.

Under the name 'H. Macdonald' we find:

'Tear not, nor soil not; Read all, but spoil not.'

'A good book is a good friend; he who would injure the one deserves not the respect of the other.'