14 B. QUARITCH, 15 PICCADILLY, LONDON. The Library of the late J. R. MacCulloch, the distinguished Political Economist, has just been sold to Lord Overstone for the sum of £5000. It was a good bargain for both parties. Mr. MacCulloch has been for 30 years an indefatigable collector; every book in his Library was a choice well selected copy of the best edition. The Library has an additional value through the fact that Mr. MacCulloch had made a very excellent Catalogue of the Collection, under the title: "A Catalogue of Books, the property of a Political Economist, with critical and bibliographical notices, royal 8vo. viii. 394 pp. London, 1862." Only a few privileged friends had the honour of receiving the volume from Mr. MacCulloch's hands, and with the following injunction: "It is particularly requested that this book be not lent, nor leave given to make extracts from it." Lord Gosford's Library. The valuable Library of this accomplished Nobleman will be sold during this season. Dr. Vrolik's Library is now selling at Amsterdam. Mr. Quaritch has just proceeded thither to attend it, and hopes to secure the best works of Dr. Vrolik's excellent collection of Zoological Works, for his establishment. The Library of the Patent Office, Southampton Buildings.-This Free Library ought to be better known to the Public and more extensively used. What the Library at Kensington, under Mr. Laskey's care, is for the Fine Arts, that of the Patent Office, under Mr. Atkinson's superintendence, is for the Practical Arts. These two libraries can be consulted with the greatest ease. Artists, 'Mechanics, Inventors, and thinking Workmen the men who help to enrich the country and thus spread happiness-can and should avail themselves of this facility. Mr. Gladstone, we hear, is engaged upon a "History of Pottery." The Chancellor of the Exchequer has long been known as an enthusiastic and refined collector; his new work, treating on an Art now so fashionable, is sure meet with a favourable reception. The British Museum. By the liberality of the Earl of Home, the Department of Manuseripts, British Museum, has acquired a very interesting and valuable illuminated MS., dated about 1510, and entitled, Le Chappellet de Jhesus et de la Vierge Marie,' bound in green velvet, studded with silver-gilt Tudor roses, five on each side, and furnished with clasps of the same metal. Upon each of the roses is placed a capital letter: those on the front of the cover are M ARG V, and those on the back are ERITE, making the name "Marguerite." This name is presumed to indicate that the book belonged to Margaret, daughter of Henry the Seventh, who married James the Fourth of Scotland, and died 1539. On the front of the upper clasp is IHS, and on the front of the lower one MA (for Maria). On the sides of the clasps are placed the letters ANNA. This little treasure contains fifty-two most elaborate illuminations illustrating the lives of Christ and the Virgin, painted with extraordinary delicacy in the manner common in the early part of the sixteenth century. As illustrating the history of Art by its decay, these drawings are extremely curious: nothing can exceed the clearness and precision of their execution; the purity and brilliancy of their colours have not often been surpassed; they are solid, elaborate, effective; but, when we examine them with the knowledge of what had been done in the art of painting on vellum two centuries before, it is obvious that the spirit of Art, the genuineness and simplicity of real design, had departed from the mind of the illuminatist, and care for mere elaboration taken its place. The illuminations are surrounded with an architectural border of dead gold, and, what is extremely rare, the vellum is painted on one side only. Ă very interesting portrait of a personage wearing the order of the Golden Fleece, and with an Imperial crown at his feet, representing the Emperor Charles the Fifth, or his brother Ferdinand, kneeling at the foot of the cross, appears near the end of the book.-Athenæum, Nov. 26, 1864. CASTILLO, CANCIONERO GENERAL, 1520 and 1527. Mr. Quaritch is charged by one of his Customers to complete two copies of the following two Cancioneros :: Castillo, Cancionero general, folio. Toledo, Villaquir, 1520. Possessors of this, the 1527 edition, in England or on the Continent, are respectfully requested to inform Mr. Q. whether in their copy the last leaf is correctly paged CCV, or in mistake CXCV: further, whether the heading of the last chapter (on the back of leaf 205) is spelt" Cōsuelo " or " Consuelo ;" further, whether Ramon de Petras' mark under the Colophon is Rs, surrounded by two circles in the centre, above it the sun, and on each side a woman leaning on the circles, or R at the bottom, supported on one side by a goat, on the other by a lion, and above it an angel on each side. Information would greatly oblige, as I have some reason to believe that there exist two editions of Castillo's Cancionero general, by Ramon de Petras, 1527, printed with a different type, though with the same Colophon, but with a variation in the printer's mark, as pointed out. Alii quidem fœminas amant, alii equos, alii aves, alii feras; mihi vero a puerulo JUL. IMP. The reading of books, what is it, but conversing with the wisest men of all ages BARROW. LONDON. MDCCCLXII. |