VALUE OF OLD BOOKS.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXIX, Issue 112, 3 July 1911, Page 6

VALUE OF OLD BOOKS.

SHOULD LIBRARIES BUY THEM? The practical value of rare books and manuscripts was discussed in an interesting manner by Mr T. W. Leys in a lecture at the Auckland Training College on Tuesday evening. His opinion on/tho subject wax'summarised in the remark that a greater value was placed on ,tho famous public and private collections than ■their public utility warranted. No doubt there wore buried in the old manuscripts stored in the British Museum and other great libraries many precious tilings in .fact and thought which .would be unearthed by students in days, to come, but there was; a temptation, under which librarians had sometimes fallen to pay from very limited resources large sums of money for first editions of books that had been reproduced both in cheap form arid fascimile. Money so expended gave little return beyond the Vulgar privilege of boasting pi the possession of something 'that no one else could afford to buy.. Mr Leys continued that be had gathered from a recent catalogue of a well-known second-hand bookseller in London the prices of various editions of Shakespeare’s plays. For a copy of the first edition published' in 1623 the price asked was £2700. A second impression, published in 16-32, was priced at £250; the third ,printed in 1601, at £180; and the fourth, in 1085,. at £l7O. The prices had no relation to the contents of the boob .of its value as a -specimen of typography of the period, though it must be understood that the prices he had quoted were for absolutely perfect copies of the works. Many old.books and manuscripts were beautiful, examples of writing and illumination, aiid'Jhe early printed books illustrated the progress made in the art of printing, hut the collection of thC.yarest examples of these works might |>q left by public librarians to millionaires. In clue time these collections would probably find their way 'into 'public libraries. Books illustrating the progress of printing in .various centuries which may be bought at moderate prices should, however, be found in every representative library.