I do not envy any man that absence of sentiment which makes some people careless of the memorials of their ancestors, and whose blood can be warmed up only by talking of horses or the price of hops.  To them solitude means ennui, and anybody’s company is preferable to their own.  What an immense amount of calm enjoyment and mental renovation do such men miss.  Even a millionaire will ease his toils, lengthen his life, and add a hundred per cent. to his daily pleasures if he becomes a bibliophile; while to the man of business with a taste for books, who through the day has struggled in the battle of life with all its irritating rebuffs and anxieties, what a blessed season of pleasurable repose opens upon him as he enters his sanctum, where every article wafts to him a welcome, and every book is a personal friend!

INDEX.

Academy, The, 23.  Acanis eruditus, 77, 78.  Acts of the Apostles, quoted, 4.  Aglossa pinguinalis, 76.  Albermarle (Duke of), portrait by Logan, 126.  Althorp library, 124.  Anderson (Sir C.), 55.  Anobium paniceum, 77, 78.  Anobium pertinax, 77, 78, 87, 88.  Antiquary, The, 54.  Antwerp, Monks at, 57, 58.  Asbestos fire, 27.  Ashburnham House, Westminster, 10.  Asiarch, an, 7.  Athens, Bookworm from, 81.  Atkyns’ Origin and Growth of Printing, 126.  Auctioneer, story of, 145.  Austin Friars, 15.  Bagford (John), the biblioclast, r:  18.  Balaclava, battle of, 143.  Bale, the antiquary, 9.  Bandinel (Dr.), 87, 88.  Beedham, B., 52.  Bible, the first printed, burnt at Strasbourg, 13.
 —­ the “bug” edition, 95. 
Bibliophile, pleasures of a, 153.  Bibliotaph, a, 129.  Bibliotheca Ecclesiae Londino-Belgicae, 16.  Binder’s creed, 31.
 —­ plough, 105. 
Binding, care to be taken of, 134.
 —­ quality of good, 104. 
Bird (Rev. -), 55.  Birdsall (Mr.), bookbinder, 80.  Birmingham Riots, 11.  Black-beetles, enemies of books, 94.  Black-letter books in United States, 91.  Blatta germanica, 65.  Boccaccio, 48-50.  Bodleian, hookworms at, 87.  Bookbinders as enemies of books, 103.  Books, absurd lettering, 111.
 —­ burnt at Carthage; at Ephesus, 4.
—­ burnt in Fire of London, 10.
—­ burnt by Saracens, 3.
—­ captured by Corsairs, 18.
—­ cleaning of, 114.
—­ deprived of title pages, 118, 119. 
Books destroyed at the Reformation, Si.
 —­ dried in an attic, 16.
—­ examination of old covers, 116.
—­ how to dust them, 134.
—­ injured by hacking, i x i.
—­ lost at sea, 17, 18.
—­ margin reduced to size, 111.
—­ mildew in, 136.
—­ from monasteries destroyed, 9.
—­ restoration when injured, 114.
—­ restored after a fire, 15.
—­ scarce before printing, 2.
—­ sold to a cobbler, 52, 149.
—­ too tight on shelves, 137.
—­ their claims to be preserved, 151.
—­ used to bake “pyes,” 10.
—­ which scratch one another, 134. 
Book-sale in Derbyshire, 145.  Bookworm, the,