The Enemies of Books

READER! are you married? Have you offspring, boys especially I mean, say between six and twelve years of age? Have you also a literary workshop, supplied with choice tools, some...

THERE is a sort of busy worm That will the fairest books deform, By gnawing holes throughout them; Alike, through every leaf they go, Yet of its merits naught they know, Nor car...

IGNORANCE, though not in the same category as fire and water, is a great destroyer of books. At the Reformation so strong was the antagonism of the people generally to anything...

THERE are many of the forces of Nature which tend to injure Books; but among them all not one has been half so destructive as Fire. It would be tedious to write out a bare list...

IN the first chapter I mentioned bookbinders among the Enemies of Books, and I tremble to think what a stinging retort might be made if some irate bibliopegist were to turn the...

AFTER all, two-legged depredators, who ought to have known better, have perhaps done as much real damage in libraries as any other enemy. I do not refer to thieves, who, if they...

A well-gilt top to a book is a great preventive against damage by dust, while to leave books with rough tops and unprotected is sure to produce stains and dirty margins.

NEXT to Fire we must rank Water in its two forms, liquid and vapour, as the greatest destroyer of books. Thousands of volumes have been actually drowned at Sea, and no more hear...

WHAT a valuable servant is Gas, and how dreadfully we should cry out were it to be banished from our homes; and yet no one who loves his books should allow a single jet in his l...

BESIDES the worm I do not think there is any insect enemy of books worth description. The domestic black-beetle, or cockroach, is far too modern an introduction to our country t...

Library invaded for the purpose of dusting.--Spring clean.---Dust to be got rid of.--Ways of doing so.--Carefulness praised.--Bad nature of certain books--Metal clasps and rivet...

Destruction of Books at the Reformation.--Mazarin library.--Caxton used to light the fire.--Library at French Protestant Church, St. Martin's-le-Grand.--Books stolen.--Story of...

Libraries destroyed by Fire.--Alexandrian.--St. Paul's destruction of MSS., Value of.--Christian books destroyed by Heathens.--Heathen books destroyed by Christians.--Hebrew boo...

Doraston.--Not so destructive as of yore.--Worm won't eat parchment.--Pierre Petit's poem.--Hooke's account and image.--Its natural history neglected.--Various sorts--Attempts t...

A good binding gives pleasure.--Deadly effects of the "plough" as used by binders.--Not confined to bye-gone times.--Instances of injury.--De Rome, a good binder but a great cro...

Books should have gilt tops.--Old libraries were neglected.--Instance of a College library.--Clothes brushed in it.--Abuses in French libraries.--Derome's account of them.--Bocc...

Bagford the biblioclast.--Illustrations torn from MSS.--Title-pages torn from books.--Rubens, his engraved titles.--Colophons torn out of books.--Lincoln Cathedral--Dr. Dibdin's...

Heer Hudde's library lost at sea.--Pinelli's library captured by Corsairs.--MSS. destroyed by Mohammed II--Books damaged by rain.--Woffenbuttel.--Vapour and Mould.--Brown stains...