Curious account of the Scarcity of Books - Of the scarcity and value of books during the seventh and many subsequent centuries, the following curious account is given by Mr. Warton, in his History of English Poetry, vol. i. "Towards the close of the seventh century, (says he,) even in the papal library at Rome, the number of books was so inconsiderable, that pope St. Martin requested Sanctamand, bishop of Maestricht, if possible, to supply this defect from the re-motest parts of Germany. In 855, Lupus, abbot of Ferriers, in France, sent two of his monks to pope Benedict III. to beg a copy of Cicero de Oratore, and Quintilian's Institutes, and some other books: * for (says the abbot) although we have part of these books, yet there is no whole or complete copy of them in all France.'Albert, abbot of Gemblours, who with incredible labour and immense expense had collected one hundred volumes on theological, and fifty on profane subjects, imagined he had formed a splendid library. About A. D. 790, Charlemagne granted an unlimited right of hunting, to the abbot and monks of Sithin, for making covers for their books of the skins of the deer they killed. These religious were probably more fond of hunting than reading; and, under these circumstances, did not manufacture many volumes. At the beginning of the tenth century, books were so scarce in Spain, that one copy of the Bible, St. Jerome's epistles, and some volumes of ecclesiastical offices and martyrologies, often served several different monasteries. In an inventory of the goods of John de Pontissara, bishop of Winchester, in his palace of Wulvesey, all the books are only septemdecim speciem librorum de diversis scientiis. This was in 1294. The same prelate, in 1299, borrows of his cathedral convent of St. Swithin, at Winchester, Bibliam bene glossatam; i. e. the Bible with marginal annotations, in two large folio volumes; but gives a bond for due return of the loan, drawn up with great sole-mnity. This Bible had been bequeathed to the convent by Pontissara's predecessor, bishop Nicholas de Ely: and in consideration of so important a bequest, pro bona Biblia dicti episcopi bene glossata, and one hundred marks in money, the monks founded a daily mass for the soul of the donor. When a single book was bequeathed to a friend, it was seldom without many restrictions. If any person gave a book to a religious house, he believed that so valuable a donation merited eternal salvation; and he offered it on the altar with great ceremony. The most formidable anathemas were peremptorily denounced against those who should dare to alienate a book presented to the cloister, or library of a religious house. The prior and convent of Rochester declare, that they will every year pronounce the irrevocable sentence of damnation on him who shall purloin or conceal a Latin translation of Aristotle's Physics, or even obliterate the title. Sometimes a book was given to a monastery, on condition that the donor should have the use of it during his life; and sometimes to a private person, on the terms that he who received it should pray for the soul of his benefactor. When a book was bought, the affair was of so much importance, that it was customary to assemble persons of consequence and character, and to make a formal record that they were present.

John Gutenberg.

Among the royal manuscripts in the book of the Sentences of Peter Lombard, an archdeacon of Lincoln has left this entry: "This book of the Sentences belongs to master Robert, archdeacon of Lincoln, which he bought of Geoffrey the chaplain, brother of Henry, vicar of Northelkington, in the presence of master Robert de Lee, master John of Lirling, Richard of Luda, clerk, Richard the almoner, the said Henry the vicar, and his clerk, and others: and the said archdeacon gave the said book to God and St. Oswald, and to Peter abbot of Barton, and the convent of Barden." The disputed property of a book often occasioned the most violent altercations. Many claims appear to have been made to a manuscript of Matthew Paris, belonging to the last mentioned library; in which John Russel, bishop of Lincoln, conditionally defends or explains his right of possession; and concludes thus, A. D. 1488, "Whoever shall obliterate or destroy this writing, let him be anathema."

About 1225, Roger de Insula, dean of York, gave several Latin Bibles to the university of Oxford, on the condition, that the students who perused them should deposit a cautionary pledge. The library of that university, before A. D. 1300, consisted only of a few tracts, chained or kept in chests in the choir of St. Mary's church. In 1327, che scholars and citizens of Oxford pillaged the opulent Benedictine abbey of the neighbouring town of Abingdon. Among the books they found there, were one hundred psalters, as many grayles, forty missals, which undoubtedly belonged to the choir of the church, and twenty-two codices, on common subjects. And although the invention of paper, at the close of the eleventh century, contributed to multiply manuscripts, and consequently to facilitate knowledge, yet, even so late as the reign of Henry VI. the following remarkable instance occurred of the inconveniences and impediments to study, which must have been produced by a scarcity of books. It is in the statutes of St. Mary's college at Oxford, founded as a seminary to Oseney abbey, in 1446: "Let no scholar occupy a book in the library above one hour, or two hours at most; so that others shall not be hindered from the use of the same!" The famous library established in the university of Oxford, by that mum-ficent patron of literature, Humphrey duke of Gloucester, contained only six hundred volumes. About the commence-ment of the fourteenth century, there were only four classics In the royal library at Paris. There was one copy of Cicero, Ovid, Lucan, and Boetius. The rest were chiefly books of devotion, which included but few of the Fathers: many treatises of astrology, geomancy, chiromancy, and medicine, originally written in Arabic, and translated into Latin or French: pandects, chronicles, and romances. This collection was principally made by Charles V. who began his reign in 1365. This monarch was passionately fond of reading; and it was the fashion to send him presents of books from every part of the kingdom of France. These he ordered to be elegantly transcribed, and richly illuminated; and he placed them in a tower of the Louvre, from thence called La Toure de la Libraire. The whole consisted of nine hundred volumes. They were deposited in three chambers, wainscoted with Irish oak, and ceiled with cypress curiously carved. The windows were of painted glass, fenced with iron bars and copper wire. The English became masters of Paris in the year 1425; on which event the Duke of Bedford, regent of France, sent the whole library, then consisting of only eight hundred and fifty-three volumes, and valued at 2223 livres, into England; where perhaps they became the groundwork of Duke Humphrey's library. Even so late as the year 1471, when Louis XI. of France borrowed the works of the Arabian physician, Rhasis, from the faculty of medicine at Paris, he not only deposited by way of pledge a quantity of valuable plate, but was obliged to procure a nobleman to join with him as a surety in a deed, by which he bound himself to return it, under a considerable forfeiture. The excessive prices of books in the middle ages afford numerous and curious proofs of the caution with which literary property was secured in those times of general ignorance.

In 1174, Walter, prior of St. Swithin's at Winchester, a writer in Latin of the lives of the bishops who were his patrons, purchased of the monks of Dorchester, in Oxford shire, Bede's Homilies and St. Austin's Psalter, for twelve measures of barley, and a pall, on which was richly embroidered in silver the history of St. Birinus converting a Saxon king. Among the royal manuscripts in the British Museum, there is Comestor's Scholastic History in French; which, as it is recorded in a blank page at the beginning, was taken from the king of France at the battle of Poictiers; and being purchased by William Montague, Earl of Salisbury, for 100 marcs, was ordered to be sold by the last will of his countess, Elizabeth, for 40 livres. About A. D. 1400, a copy of Johr. of Meun's Romance de la Rose, was sold before the palace gate at Paris for a sum equal to £33. 6s. 6d.