Arridet D***:  habet nos una voluptas.  Me quoque librorum meministis amore teneri, Atque virum studiis, quos Gallia jactat alumnos:  Nam si Caxtonio felix nunc Anglia gaudet, Non minus ipsa etiam Stephanorum nomina laudat.  Hic nonnulla manent priscae vestigia famae.  Nobis Thucydides, Xenophon quoque pumice et auro, Quem poliit non parca manus; felicior ille Si possit ...[F] melius conjungere Musas! [Greek:  Koina ta panta philon] perhibent:  at semper amici Quidquid doctorum est:  tantis ego laetor amicis.  AEternum haec vigeat concordia pocula firment Artesque et libri, quae nectant foedera reges, Utramque et socient simul omnia vincula gentem.

      CECINIT JOAN.  B. GAIL,

      Lector regius in biblioth. regia codd. gr. et lat. praefectus.

While one of the London morning newspapers (which shall be here nameless) chose to convert this harmless scene of festive mirth into a coarse and contemptible attack upon its author, the well-bred Bibliomanes of Paris viewed it with a different feeling, and drew from it a more rational inference.  It was supposed, by several gentlemen of education and fortune, that a RIVAL SOCIETY might be established among themselves—­partaking in some degree of the nature of that of the ROXBURGHE, although necessarily regulated by a few different laws.

Taking the regulations of the ROXBURGHE CLUB (as laid down in the Ninth Day of the Decameron) as the basis, they put together a code of laws for the regulation of a similar Society which they chose, very aptly, to call LES BIBLIOPHILES.  Behold then, under a new name, a Parisian Roxburghe Society.  When I visited Paris, in the summer, of 1819, I got speedily introduced to the leading Members of the club, and obtained, from M. DURAND DE LANCON, (one of the most devoted and most efficient of the members) that information—­which is here submitted to the public:  from a persuasion that it cannot be deemed wholly uninteresting, or out of order, even by the most violent enemies of the cause.”  The object of this Society of the BIBLIOPHILES must be expressed in the proper language of the country.  It is “pour nourrir, relever, et faire naitre meme la passion de la Bibliomanie.”  I put it to the conscience of the most sober-minded observer of men and things—­if any earthly object can be more orthodox and legitimate?  The Society meet, as a corporate body, twice in the year:  once in April, the second time in December; and date the foundation of their Club from the 1st of January 1820.  Whatever they print, bears the general title of “Melanges;"[G] but whether this word will be executed in the black-letter, lower-case, or in roman capitals, is not yet determined upon.  One or two things, however, at starting, cannot fail to be premised;