It is to be regretted that so few English
collectors have cared to leave their marks of ownership on the books
they have taken so much pleasure in bringing together. Michael Wodhull
was a model in this respect, for his book-stamp is one of the most
pleasing of English origin, and his autograph notes recording the prices
he paid for his treasures, and his assiduous collation of them, make
them doubly precious in the eyes of subsequent owners. Mr. Grenville
also had his book-stamp, though there is little joy to be won from it,
for it is unpleasing in itself, and is too often found spoiling a fine
old binding. Mr. Cracherode's stamp was as graceful as Wodhull's; but,
as a rule, our English collectors, though, as Mr. Fletcher is
discovering, many more of them than is generally known have possessed a
stamp, have not often troubled to use it, and their collections have
never obtained the reputation which they deserve, mainly for lack of
marks of ownership to keep them green in the memory of later possessors.
That this should be so in a country where book-plates have been so
common may at first seem surprising. But book-plates everywhere have
been used rather by the small collectors than the great ones, and the
regrettable peculiarity of our English bookmen is, not that they
despised this rather fugitive sign of possession, but that for the most
part they despised book-stamps as well.
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