Books and Bookmen

The famous Marguerite de Valois, the wife of Henri IV., had certainly a noble library, and many beautifully bound books stamped with daisies are attributed to her collections. They bear the motto, “Expectata non eludet,” which appears to refer, first to the daisy (“Margarita”), which is punctual in the spring, or rather is “the constellated flower that never sets,” and next, to the lady, who will “keep tryst.” But is the lady Marguerite de Valois? Though the books have been sold at very high prices as relics of the leman of La Mole, it seems impossible to demonstrate that they were ever on her shelves, that they were bound by Clovis Eve from her own design. “No mention is made of them in any contemporary document, and the judicious are reduced to conjectures.” Yet they form a most important collection, systematically bound, science and philosophy in citron morocco, the poets in green, and history and theology in red. In any case it is absurd to explain “Expectata non eludet” as a reference to the lily of the royal arms, which appears on the centre of the daisy-pied volumes. The motto, in that case, would run, “Expectata (lilia) non eludent.” As it stands, the feminine adjective, “expectata,” in the singular, must apply either to the lady who owned the volumes, or to the “Margarita,” her emblem, or to both. Yet the ungrammatical rendering is that which M. Bauchart suggests. Many of the books, Marguerite’s or not, were sold at prices over £100 in London, in 1884 and 1883. The Macrobius, and Theocritus, and Homer are in the Cracherode collection at the British Museum. The daisy crowned Ronsard went for £430 at the Beckford sale. These prices will probably never be reached again.

If Anne of Austria, the mother of Louis XIV., was a bibliophile, she may be suspected of acting on the motive, “Love me, love my books.” About her affection for Cardinal Mazarin there seems to be no doubt: the Cardinal had a famous library, and his royal friend probably imitated his tastes. In her time, and on her volumes, the originality and taste of the skilled binder, Le Gascon, begin to declare themselves. The fashionable passion for lace, to which La Fontaine made such sacrifices, affected the art of book decorations, and Le Gascon’s beautiful patterns of gold points and dots are copies of the productions of Venice. The Queen-Mother’s books include many devotional treatises, for, whatever other fashions might come and go, piety was always constant before the Revolution. Anne of Austria seems to have been particularly fond of the lives and works of Saint Theresa, and Saint François de Sales, and John of the Cross. But she was not unread in the old French poets, such as Coquillart; she condescended to Ariosto; she had that dubious character, Théophile de Viaud, beautifully bound; she owned the Rabelais of 1553; and, what is particularly interesting, M. de Lignerolles possesses her copy of ‘L’Eschole des Femmes, Comédie par J. B. P. Molière. Paris: Guillaume de Luynes, 1663.’ In 12°, red morocco, gilt edges, and the Queen’s arms on the covers. This relic is especially valuable when we remember that ‘L’Ecole des Femmes’ and Arnolphe’s sermon to Agnès, and his comic threats of future punishment first made envy take the form of religious persecution. The devout Queen-Mother was often appealed to by the enemies of Molière, yet Anne of Austria had not only seen his comedy, but possessed this beautiful example of the first edition. M. Paul Lacroix supposes that this copy was offered to the Queen-Mother by Molière himself. The frontispiece (Arnolphe preaching to Agnès) is thought to be a portrait of Molière, but in the reproduction in M. Louis Lacour’s edition it is not easy to see any resemblance. Apparently Anne did not share the views, even in her later years, of the converted Prince de Conty, for several comedies and novels remain stamped with her arms and device.

The learned Marquise de Rambouillet, the parent of all the ‘Précieuses,’ must have owned a good library, but nothing is chronicled save her celebrated book of prayers and meditations, written out and decorated by Jarry. It is bound in red morocco, doublé with green, and covered with V’s in gold. The Marquise composed the prayers for her own use, and Jarry was so much struck with their beauty that he asked leave to introduce them into the Book of Hours which he had to copy, “for the prayers are often so silly,” said he, “that I am ashamed to write them out.”

Here is an example of the devotions which Jarry admired, a prayer to Saint Louis. It was published in ‘Miscellanies Bibliographiques’ by M. Prosper Blanchemain.

PRIÈRE À SAINT-LOUIS,Roy de France

Grand Roy, bien que votre couronne ayt esté des plus esclatantes de la Terre, celle que vous portez dans le ciel est incomparablement plus précieuse. L’une estoit perissable l’autre est immortelle et ces lys dont la blancheur se pouvoit ternir, sont maintenant incorruptibles. Vostre obeissance envers vostre mère; vostre justice envers vos sujets; et vos guerres contre les infideles, vous ont acquis la veneration de tous les peuples; et la France doit à vos travaux et à vostre piété l’inestimable tresor de la sanglante et glorieuse couronne du Sauveur du monde. Priez-le incomparable Saint qu’il donne une paix perpetuëlle au Royaume dont vous avez porté le sceptre; qu’il le préserve d’hérésie; qu’il y face toûjours regner saintement vostre illustre Sang; et que tous ceux qui ont l’honneur d’en descendre soient pour jamais fidèles à son Eglise.

The daughter of the Marquise, the fair Julie, heroine of that “long courting” by M. de Montausier, survives in those records as the possessor of ‘La Guirlande de Julie,’ the manuscript book of poems by eminent hands. But this manuscript seems to have been all the library of Julie; therein she could constantly read of her own perfections. To be sure she had also ‘L’Histoire de Gustave Adolphe,’ a hero for whom, like Major Dugald Dalgetty, she cherished a supreme devotion. In the ‘Guirlande’ Chapelain’s verses turn on the pleasing fancy that the Protestant Lion of the North, changed into a flower (like Paul Limayrac in M. Banville’s ode), requests Julie to take pity on his altered estate:

Sois pitoyable à ma langueur;

Et si je n’ay place en ton cœur

Que je l’aye au moins sur ta teste.

These verses were reckoned consummate.

The ‘Guirlande’ is still, with happier fate than attends most books, in the hands of the successors of the Duc and Duchesse de Montausier.

Like Julie, Madame de Maintenon was a précieuse, but she never had time to form a regular library. Her books, however, were bound by Duseuil, a binder immortal in the verse of Pope; or it might be more correct to say that Madame de Maintenon’s own books are seldom distinguishable from those of her favourite foundation, St. Cyr. The most interesting is a copy of the first edition of ‘Esther,’ in quarto (1689), bound in red morocco, and bearing, in Racine’s hand, “A Madame la Marquise de Maintenon, offert avec respect, —Racine.”

Doubtless Racine had the book bound before he presented it. “People are discontented,” writes his son Louis, “if you offer them a book in a simple marbled paper cover.” I could wish that this worthy custom were restored, for the sake of the art of binding, and also because amateur poets would be more chary of their presentation copies. It is, no doubt, wise to turn these gifts with their sides against the inner walls of bookcases, to be bulwarks against the damp, but the trouble of acknowledging worthless presents from strangers is considerable. 19

Another interesting example of Madame de Maintenon’s collections is Dacier’s ‘Remarques Critiques sur les Œuvres d’Horace,’ bearing the arms of Louis XIV., but with his wife’s signature on the fly-leaf (1681).

Of Madame de Montespan, ousted from the royal favour by Madame de Maintenon, who “married into the family where she had been governess,” there survives one bookish relic of interest. This is ‘Œuvres Diverses par un auteur de sept ans,’ in quarto, red morocco, printed on vellum, and with the arms of the mother of the little Duc du Maine (1678). When Madame de Maintenon was still playing mother to the children of the king and of Madame de Montespan, she printed those “works” of her eldest pupil.

These ladies were only bibliophiles by accident, and were devoted, in the first place, to pleasure, piety, or ambition. With the Comtesse de Verrue, whose epitaph will be found on an earlier page, we come to a genuine and even fanatical collector. Madame de Verrue (1670–1736) got every kind of diversion out of life, and when she ceased to be young and fair, she turned to the joys of “shopping.” In early years, “pleine de cœur, elle le donna sans comptes.” In later life, she purchased, or obtained on credit, everything that caught her fancy, also sans comptes. “My aunt,” says the Duc de Luynes, “was always buying, and never baulked her fancy.” Pictures, books, coins, jewels, engravings, gems (over 8,000), tapestries, and furniture were all alike precious to Madame de Verrue. Her snuff-boxes defied computation; she had them in gold, in tortoise-shell, in porcelain, in lacquer, and in jasper, and she enjoyed the delicate fragrance of sixty different sorts of snuff. Without applauding the smoking of cigarettes in drawing-rooms, we may admit that it is less repulsive than steady applications to tobacco in Madame de Verrue’s favourite manner.

The Countess had a noble library, for old tastes survived in her commodious heart, and new tastes she anticipated. She possessed ‘The Romance of the Rose,’ and ‘Villon,’ in editions of Galliot du Pré (1529–1533) undeterred by the satire of Boileau. She had examples of the ‘Pleïade,’ though they were not again admired in France till 1830. She was also in the most modern fashion of to-day, for she had the beautiful quarto of La Fontaine’s ‘Contes,’ and Bouchier’s illustrated Molière (large paper). And, what I envy her more, she had Perrault’s ‘Fairy Tales,’ in blue morocco – the blue rose of the folklorist who is also a book-hunter. It must also be confessed that Madame de Verrue had a large number of books such as are usually kept under lock and key, books which her heirs did not care to expose at the sale of her library. Once I myself (moi chétif) owned a novel in blue morocco, which had been in the collection of Madame de Verrue. In her old age this exemplary woman invented a peculiarly comfortable arm-chair, which, like her novels, was covered with citron and violet morocco; the nails were of silver. If Madame de Verrue has met the Baroness Bernstein, their conversation in the Elysian Fields must be of the most gallant and interesting description.

Another literary lady of pleasure, Madame de Pompadour, can only be spoken of with modified approval. Her great fault was that she did not check the decadence of taste and sense in the art of bookbinding. In her time came in the habit of binding books (if binding it can be called) with flat backs, without the nerves and sinews that are of the very essence of book-covers. Without these no binding can be permanent, none can secure the lasting existence of a volume. It is very deeply to be deplored that by far the most accomplished living English artist in bookbinding has reverted to this old and most dangerous heresy. The most original and graceful tooling is of much less real value than permanence, and a book bound with a flat back, without nerfs, might practically as well not be bound at all. The practice was the herald of the French and may open the way for the English Revolution. Of what avail were the ingenious mosaics of Derome to stem the tide of change, when the books whose sides they adorned were not really bound at all? Madame de Pompadour’s books were of all sorts, from the inevitable works of devotions to devotions of another sort, and the ‘Hours’ of Erycina Ridens. One of her treasures had singular fortunes, a copy of ‘Daphnis and Chloe,’ with the Regent’s illustrations, and those of Cochin and Eisen (Paris, quarto, 1757, red morocco). The covers are adorned with billing and cooing doves, with the arrows of Eros, with burning hearts, and sheep and shepherds. Eighteen years ago this volume was bought for 10 francs in a village in Hungary. A bookseller gave £8 for it in Paris. M. Bauchart paid for it £150; and as it has left his shelves, probably he too made no bad bargain. Madame de Pompadour’s ‘Apology for Herodotus’ (La Haye, 1735) has also its legend. It belonged to M. Paillet, who coveted a glorified copy of the ‘Pastissier François,’ in M. Bauchart’s collection. M Paillet swopped it, with a number of others, for the ‘Pastissier:’

J’avais ‘L’Apologie

Pour Hérodote,’ en reliûre ancienne, amour

De livre provenant de chez la Pompadour

Il me le soutira! 20

Of Marie Antoinette, with whom our lady book-lovers of the old régime must close, there survive many books. She had a library in the Tuileries, as well as at le petit Trianon. Of all her great and varied collections, none is now so valued as her little book of prayers, which was her consolation in the worst of all her evil days, in the Temple and the Conciergerie. The book is ‘Office de la Divine Providence’ (Paris, 1757, green morocco). On the fly-leaf the Queen wrote, some hours before her death, these touching lines: “Ce 16 Octobre, à 4 h. ½ du matin. Mon Dieu! ayez pitié de moi! Mes yeux n’ont plus de larmes pour prier pour vous, mes pauvres enfants. Adieu, adieu! – Marie Antoinette.”

There can be no sadder relic of a greater sorrow, and the last consolation of the Queen did not escape the French popular genius for cruelty and insult. The arms on the covers of the prayer-book have been cut out by some fanatic of Equality and Fraternity.

FOOTNOTES

***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK BOOKS AND BOOKMEN***

1

“Slate” is a professional term for a severe criticism. Clearly the word is originally “slat,” a narrow board of wood, with which a person might be beaten.

2

Histoire des Intrigues Amoureuses de Molière, et de celles de sa femme. (A la Sphère.) A Francfort, chez Frédéric Arnaud, MDCXCVII. This anonymous tract has actually been attributed to Racine. The copy referred to is marked with a large N in red, with an eagle’s head.

3

The Lady of the Lake, 1810.

The Lay of the Last Minstrel, 1806“To Mrs. Robert Laidlaw, Peel. From the Author.”

4

Dictys Cretensis. Apud Lambertum Roulland. Lut. Paris., 1680. In red morocco, with the arms of Colbert.

5

L. Annæi Senecæ Opera Omnia. Lug. Bat., apud Elzevirios. 1649. With book-plate of the Duke of Sussex.

6

Stratonis Epigrammata. Altenburgi, 1764. Straton bound up in one volume with Epictetus! From the Beckford library.

7

Opera Helii Eobani Hessi. Yellow morocco, with the first arms of De Thou. Includes a poem addressed “Lange, decus meum.” Quantity of penultimate “Eobanus” taken for granted, metri gratiâ.

8

La Journée du Chrétien. Coutances, 1831. With inscription, “Léon Gambetta. Rue St. Honoré. Janvier 1, 1848.”

9

Villoison’s Homer. Venice, 1788. With Tessier’s ticket and Schlegel’s book-plate.

10

Les Essais de Michel, Seigneur de Montaigne. “Pour François le Febvre de Lyon, 1695.” With autograph of Gul. Drummond, and cipresso e palma.

11

“The little old foxed Molière,” once the property of William Pott, unknown to fame.

12

That there ever were such editors is much disputed. The story may be a fiction of the age of the Ptolemies.

13

Or, more easily, in Maury’s Religions de la Grèce.

14

See Essay on ‘Lady Book-Lovers.’

15

See Essay on ‘Lady Book-Lovers.’

16

For a specimen of Madame Pompadour’s binding see overleaf. She had another Rabelais in calf, lately to be seen in a shop in Pall Mall.

17

Mr. Payne does not give the date of the edition from which he copies the cut. Apparently it is of the fifteenth century.

18

Reproduced in The Library, p. 94.

19

Country papers, please copy. Poets at a distance will kindly accept this intimation.

20

Bibliothèque d’un Bibliophile. Lille, 1885.