The Library [34]
died 1617). But it was in the second and third generations that Bonaventura and Abraham Elzevir began to publish at Leyden, their editions in small duodecimo. Like Aldus, these Elzevirs aimed at producing books at once handy, cheap, correct, and beautiful in execution. Their adventure was a complete success. The Elzevirs did not, like Aldus, surround themselves with the most learned scholars of their time. Their famous literary adviser, Heinsius, was full of literary jealousies, and kept students of his own calibre at a distance. The classical editions of the Elzevirs, beautiful, but too small in type for modern eyes, are anything but exquisitely correct. Their editions of the contemporary. French authors, now classics themselves, are lovely examples of skill in practical enterprise. The Elzevirs treated the French authors much as American publishers treat Englishmen. They stole right and left, but no one complained much in these times of slack copyright; and, at all events, the piratic larcenous publications of the Dutch printers were pretty, and so far satisfactory. They themselves, in turn, were the victims of fraudulent and untradesmanlike imitations. It is for this, among other reasons, that the collector of Elzevirs must make M. Willems's book ("Les Elzevier," Brussels and Paris, 1880) his constant study. Differences so minute that they escape the unpractised eye, denote editions of most various value. In Elzevirs a line's breadth of margin is often worth a hundred pounds, and a misprint is quoted at no less a sum. The fantastic caprice of bibliophiles has revelled in the bibliography of these Dutch editions. They are at present very scarce in England, where a change in fashion some years ago had made them common enough. No Elzevir is valuable unless it be clean and large in the margins. When these conditions are satisfied the question of rarity comes in, and Remy Belleau's Macaronic poem, or "Le Pastissier Francais," may rise to the price of four or five hundred pounds. A Rabelais, Moliere, or Corneille, of a "good" edition, is now more in request than the once adored "Imitatio Christi" (dateless), or the "Virgil"' of 1646, which is full of gross errors of the press, but is esteemed for red characters in the letter to Augustus, and another passage at page 92. The ordinary marks of the Elzevirs were the sphere, the old hermit, the Athena, the eagle, and the burning faggot. But all little old books marked with spheres are not Elzevirs, as many booksellers suppose. Other printers also stole the designs for the tops of chapters, the Aegipan, the Siren, the head of Medusa, the crossed sceptres, and the rest. In some cases the Elzevirs published their books, especially when they were piracies, anonymously. When they published for the Jansenists, they allowed their clients to put fantastic pseudonyms on the title pages. But, except in four cases, they had only two pseudonyms used on the titles of books published by and for themselves. These disguises are "Jean Sambix" for Jean and Daniel Elzevir, at Leyden, and for the Elzevirs of Amsterdam, "Jacques le Jeune." The last of the great representatives of the house, Daniel, died at Amsterdam, 1680. Abraham, an unworthy scion, struggled on at Leyden till 1712. The family still prospers, but no longer prints, in Holland. It is common to add duodecimos of Foppens, Wolfgang, and other printers, to the collections of the Elzevirs. The books of Wolfgang have the sign of the fox robbing a wild bee's nest, with the motto Quaerendo.
Curious and singular books are the next in our classification. The category is too large. The books that be "curious" (not in the booksellers' sense of "prurient" and "disgusting,") are innumerable. All suppressed and condemned books, from "Les Fleurs du Mal" to Vanini's "Amphitheatrum," or the English translation of Bruno's "Spaccia della Bestia Trionfante," are more or less rare, and more or less curious. Wild books, like William Postel's "Three Marvellous Triumphs of Women," are "curious." Freakish books, like macaronic
Curious and singular books are the next in our classification. The category is too large. The books that be "curious" (not in the booksellers' sense of "prurient" and "disgusting,") are innumerable. All suppressed and condemned books, from "Les Fleurs du Mal" to Vanini's "Amphitheatrum," or the English translation of Bruno's "Spaccia della Bestia Trionfante," are more or less rare, and more or less curious. Wild books, like William Postel's "Three Marvellous Triumphs of Women," are "curious." Freakish books, like macaronic