THOMAS HEARNE, 1678-1735

Thomas Hearne, the eminent antiquary, was born in July 1678 at Littlefield Green in the parish of White Waltham, Berkshire, where his father, George Hearne, was the parish clerk. At a very early age he showed such marked ability that Francis Cherry, the nonjuror, who resided at Shottesbrooke in the same neighbourhood, undertook to defray the cost of his education, and first sent him to the free school of Bray, and afterwards, in 1695, to St. Edmund Hall, Oxford. This kindness is frequently referred to by Hearne, who speaks of his benefactor as 'my best friend and patron.' He took the degrees of B.A.

in 1679, and M.A. four years later. While an undergraduate, Dr. John Mill, the Princ.i.p.al of St. Edmund Hall, and Dr. Grabe employed him in the collation of ma.n.u.scripts; and Hearne tells us in his _Autobiography_ that, after taking his B.A. degree, 'he constantly went to the Bodleian Library every day, and studied there as long as the time allowed by the Statutes would admit.' His industry and learning attracted the notice of Dr. Hudson, who had been recently elected Keeper of the Bodleian Library, and, in 1701, by his influence Hearne was made Janitor, or a.s.sistant, in the Library, succeeding to the post of Second Librarian in 1712. The duties of this appointment he continued to perform until the 23rd of January 1716, the last day fixed by the Act for taking the oaths to the Hanoverian dynasty. These oaths as a nonjuror he could not conscientiously take, and he was in consequence deprived of his office on the ground of 'neglect of duty'; but the Rev. W.D. Macray, in his _Annals of the Bodleian Library_, tells us that 'to the end of his life he maintained that he was still, _de jure_, Sub-librarian, and with a quaint pertinacity, regularly at the end of each term and half-year, up to March 30, 1735, continued to set down, in one of the volumes of his Diary, that no fees had been paid him, and that his half-year's salary was due.' Hearne continued a staunch nonjuror to the end of his days, and refused many University appointments, including the Keepership of the Bodleian Library, which he might have had, had he been willing to take the oath of allegiance to the government; but he preferred, to use his own words, 'a good conscience before all manner of preferment and worldly honour.' The Earl of Oxford offered to make him his librarian on Wanley's death, but this post he also declined, and continued to reside to the end of his life at St. Edmund Hall, engaged in preparing and publishing his various antiquarian and historical works. He died on the 10th of June 1735, and was buried in the churchyard of St.

Peter's-in-the-East at Oxford. Hearne, who was a man of unwearied industry, and a most devoted antiquary, is described by Pope in the _Dunciad_, under the t.i.tle of Wormius--

'But who is he, in closet close ypent, Of sober face, with learned dust besprent?

Right well mine eyes arede the myster wight, On parchment sc.r.a.ps y-fed, and Wormius hight.'

[Ill.u.s.tration: _THOMAS HEARNE M.A. of Edmund Hall Oxon._]

Hearne ama.s.sed a considerable collection of ma.n.u.scripts and printed books, of which he made a catalogue, with the prices he gave for them.

This ma.n.u.script came into the possession of Mr. Beriah Botfield, M.P., of Norton Hall, Northamptonshire, who privately printed some extracts from it in 1848.

Hearne left all his ma.n.u.scripts and books with ma.n.u.script notes to Mr.

William Bedford, son of the nonjuring bishop, Hilkiah Bedford, whose widow sold them to Dr. Richard Rawlinson for one hundred guineas, and by him they were bequeathed to the Bodleian Library. Hearne's diary and note-books, in about one hundred and fifty small duodecimo volumes, were among them.[66] His printed books were sold by Thomas...o...b..rne on the 16th of February 1736, and following days. The t.i.tle-page of the catalogue reads: 'A Catalogue of the Valuable Library of that great Antiquarian Mr. Tho. Hearne of Oxford: and of another Gentleman of Note. Consisting of a very great Variety of Uncommon Books, and scarce ever to be met withal.

Which will begin to be sold very cheap, the lowest Price mark'd in each Book, at T. Osborne's Shop in Gray's Inn, on Monday the 16th day of February 1735-36.'

The t.i.tle-page has also a small portrait of Hearne, with the following lines below it:--

'Pox on't quoth time to Thomas Hearne, Whatever I forget, you learn.'

The catalogue contains six thousand seven hundred and seventy-six lots.

Hearne's publications, which were almost all printed by subscription at Oxford, are very numerous. Among the most valuable are an edition of Livy in 6 vols., 1708; the _Life of Alfred the Great_, from Sir John Spelman's ma.n.u.script in the Bodleian Library, 1710; Leland's _Itinerary_, 9 vols., 1710; Leland's _Collectanea_, 6 vols., 1715; Roper's _Life of Sir Thomas More_, 1716; Camden's _Annals_, 3 vols., 1717; _Curious Discourses by Eminent Antiquaries_, 1720; Robert of Gloucester's _Chronicle_, 2 vols., 1724; Peter of Langtoft's _Chronicle_, 2 vols., 1725; _Liber Niger Scaccarii_, 2 vols., 1728; and Walter of Hemingford's _History_, 2 vols., 1731.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 66: Extracts from these volumes were published by Dr. Bliss in 1857, and again in 1869, under the t.i.tle of _Reliquiae Hearnianae_; and Hearne's _Remarks and Collections_ are now being printed by the Oxford Historical Society.]

THOMAS RAWLINSON, 1681-1725

Thomas Rawlinson, who, Dibdin says, 'may be called the Leviathan of book-collectors during nearly the first thirty years of the eighteenth century,' was born in the Old Bailey on the 25th of March 1681. He was the eldest son of Sir Thomas Rawlinson, Lord Mayor of London in 1705-6, by Mary, eldest daughter of Richard Tayler, of Turnham Green, Middles.e.x, who kept the Devil Tavern near Temple Bar. He was also an elder brother of Dr. Richard Rawlinson, the nonjuring bishop, who was himself an ardent collector. In 1699 he matriculated at the University of Oxford from St. John's College, having been previously educated at Cheam under William Day, and at Eton. He was called to the bar in 1705, and applied himself to the study of munic.i.p.al law; but three years later, on the death of his father in 1708, who left him a large estate, he devoted himself to the collection of books, ma.n.u.scripts and pictures. His love for books appears to have been early fostered by his grandfather, Richard Tayler, who settled upon him, while a schoolboy at Eton, an annuity of fourteen pounds per annum for his life to buy books with; 'which,' Hearne informs us in his Diary, 'he not only fully expended, and n.o.bly answered the end of the donor, but indeed laid out his whole fortune this way, so as to acquire a collection of books, both for number and value, hardly to be equalled by any one study in England.'

For some years Rawlinson resided in Gray's Inn, but in 1716, having filled his four rooms so completely with books that he was obliged to sleep in the pa.s.sage, he was compelled to move, and he took lodgings at London House, in Aldersgate Street, an ancient palace of the bishops of London, but at that time the residence of Mr. Samuel May, a wealthy druggist. Here he lived, says Oldys, 'in his bundles, piles, and bulwarks of paper, in dust and cobwebs,' until the 6th of August 1725, when he died, and was buried in St. Botolph's Church, Aldersgate Street.

Rawlinson was a Fellow of the Royal Society, and of the Society of Antiquaries. He was also a Governor of Bridewell and Bethlehem Hospitals. About a year before his decease he married his servant, Amy Frewin, but left no issue.

Towards the end of his life Rawlinson became involved in pecuniary difficulties, and he sold a portion of his collection by auction to meet his liabilities. Prior to his death there were five sales, the first of which took place on the 4th of December 1721, which realised two thousand four hundred and nine pounds. But when he died an enormous number of books were still left, and it required eleven additional sales, which extended to March 1734, to dispose of them and the ma.n.u.scripts, of which there were upwards of a thousand. These sales lasted on an average for more than twenty-one days each, but it should be observed that they took place in the evening, generally commencing at five o'clock. All Rawlinson's books were sold by Thomas Ballard, the bookseller, at the St. Paul's Coffee House, with the exception of those disposed of at the seventh and eighth sales, which were sold by Charles Davis, the bookseller; the former at London House, and the latter at the Bedford Coffee House, in the great Piazza, Covent Garden. In addition to the printed books and ma.n.u.scripts, Rawlinson's gallery of paintings was sold at the Two Golden Bulls in Hart Street, Covent Garden, on April the 4th and 5th 1734, in one hundred and seventeen lots. Among the portraits was one in crayons of Rawlinson by his brother Richard.

Copies of the sale catalogues of Thomas Rawlinson's books are very rare, but the Bodleian Library possesses an entire set of them, almost all of which are marked with the prices which the books fetched, while two or three have also the names of the purchasers. A fairly correct list of them is given by Dibdin in his _Bibliomania_, which he made from a complete collection of them in the Heber library. The catalogue of the ma.n.u.scripts was compiled by Rawlinson's brother Richard.

Rawlinson's books appear to have realised but poor prices, for Hearne writes in his Diary (Nov. 10th, 1734), that 'Dr. Rawlinson by the sale of his brother's books hath not rais'd near the money expected. For, it seems, they have ill answer'd, however good books; the MSS. worse, and what the prints will do is as yet undetermin'd.' No doubt the low prices were caused by the immense number of books thrown upon the market by Rawlinson's sales; for, as early as April 1723, Hearne tells us in his Diary that 'the editions of cla.s.sicks of the first print (commonly called _Editiones Principes_), that used to go at prodigious prices, are now strangely lowered; occasioned, in good measure, by Mr. Tho.

Rawlinson, my friend's, being forced to sell many of his books, in whose auction these books went cheap, tho' English history and antiquities went dear: and yet this gentleman was the chief man that raised many curious and cla.s.sical books so high, by his generous and couragious way of bidding.' It is quite possible too that Rawlinson's books were not always in the finest condition, and had suffered from the dust and cobwebs of which Oldys speaks.

The Caxtons, of which there were upwards of five and twenty (perfect and imperfect), realised but very moderate prices. _The Recuyell of the Histories of Troy_ sold for two pounds, seven shillings; Gower's _Confessio Amantis_ for two pounds, fourteen shillings and sixpence; _The Golden Legend_ for three pounds, twelve shillings; and Lydgate's _Life of Our Lady_ for two pounds, thirteen shillings. _The Histories of King Arthur and his Knights_, for which Mr. Quaritch, at the Earl of Jersey's sale in 1885, gave as much as nineteen hundred and fifty pounds, fetched no more than two pounds, four shillings and sixpence.

These were the highest prices obtained. Many of the volumes went for a few shillings--the first edition of _The Dictes or Sayings_ for fifteen shillings, Chaucer's _Book of Fame_ for nine shillings and twopence, and _The Moral Proverbs of Christine de Pisan_ for four shillings and tenpence. Mr. Blades does not make any mention of Thomas Rawlinson's Caxtons in his life of the printer.

Rawlinson appears to have greatly increased the number of separate works in his library by breaking up the volumes of tracts; for Oldys complains, 'that out of one volume he made many, and all the tracts or pamphlets that came to his hands in volumes and bound together, he separated to sell them singly, so that what some curious men had been pairing and sorting half their lives to have a topic or argument complete, he by this means confused and dispersed again.'

Dr. Richard Rawlinson said of his brother that he collected in almost all faculties, but more particularly old and beautiful editions of the cla.s.sical authors, and whatever directly or indirectly related to English history. As early as 1712 Rawlinson told Hearne that his library had cost him two thousand pounds, and that it was worth five thousand.

Among many other choice and rare books in the collection were three copies of Archbishop Parker's _De Antiquitate Britannicae Ecclesiae_. Two of them are now in the Bodleian Library, and the Rev. W.D. Macray, in his _Annals of the Bodleian Library_, states that 'one of these is the identical copy described by Strype in his Life of Parker, and which was then in possession of Bp. Fleetwood of Ely.'

Rawlinson's pa.s.sion for collecting books was evidently well known to his contemporaries, for Addison, who disliked and despised bibliomaniacs, gives a satirical account of him, under the name of 'Tom Folio,' in No.

158 of _The Tatler_. Hearne, who was greatly indebted to Rawlinson for a.s.sistance in his antiquarian labours, warmly defends his friend:--'Some gave out,' he writes, 'and published it too in printed papers, that Mr.

Rawlinson understood the editions and t.i.tle-pages of books only, without any other skill in them, and thereupon they styled him TOM FOLIO. But these were only buffoons, and persons of very shallow learning. 'Tis certain that Mr. Rawlinson understood the t.i.tles and editions of books better than any man I ever knew (for he had a very great memory), but besides this, he was a great reader, and had read abundantly of the best writers, ancient and modern, throughout, and was entirely master of the learning contained in them. He had digested the cla.s.sicks so well as to be able readily and upon all occasions (what I have very often admired) to make use of pa.s.sages from them very pertinently, what I never knew in so great perfection in any other person whatsoever.'[67]

A poem of twenty-six lines by Rawlinson on the death of the Duke of Gloucester in 1700 was printed in a collection of verses written by members of the University of Oxford on that event. This appears to be his only publication with his name attached. The pretty edition of the _Satires of Juvenal and Persius_, published at London in 1716, and edited by Michael Maittaire, was dedicated by him to Rawlinson.

It is stated in Nichols's _Literary Anecdotes of the Eighteenth Century_ (vol. v. p. 704) that the following inscription was found among the papers of Rawlinson, written with his own hand, and in all probability designed by him for part of an epitaph on himself:--

'Hic jacet----Vir liberrimi Spiritus qui omnes Mortales pari ratione habuit; tacuisse de Criminibus non auro vendidit.

Qui, Rege dempto, neminem agnovit superiorem; illum vero, O infortunium! nunquam potuit inspicere.'

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 67: _Diary_, Sept. 4, 1725.]

JOSEPH SMITH, 1682-1770

[Ill.u.s.tration: BOOK-PLATE OF JOSEPH SMITH.]

Joseph Smith, a portion of whose collection formed the foundation of King George III.'s library, now in the British Museum, was born in 1682.

Nothing appears to be known about his parents and his early years, but at the age of nineteen he took up his residence at Venice, where he spent his life, apparently engaged in commerce.[68] In 1740 he was appointed British Consul in that city, and he died there on the 6th of November 1770, aged eighty-eight.

Smith was well known as a collector of books, ma.n.u.scripts, and works of art. In 1762 George III. purchased all the books Smith had ama.s.sed up to that time for about ten thousand pounds, and at a later period the king also bought his pictures, coins, and gems for the sum of twenty thousand pounds. After the sale of his library Smith still continued to collect, and the books which he subsequently acquired were sold after his death, partly by auction by Baker and Leigh at their house in York Street, Covent Garden, on Monday, January 25th, 1773, and the thirteen following days, and partly in the shop of James Robson, bookseller, in New Bond Street. Those sold by Baker and Leigh realised two thousand two hundred and forty-five pounds. A portion of his ma.n.u.scripts was purchased by the Earl of Sunderland for one thousand five hundred pounds. Smith's library was rich in the best and scarcest editions of Latin, Italian and French authors. It also contained a considerable number of fine ma.n.u.scripts, some of them beautifully illuminated, and many valuable books of prints and antiquities.

About 1727 Smith compiled a catalogue, which was limited to twenty-five copies, of some of the rarest books in his collection, of which a second edition with additions was published in 1737. A catalogue of his entire library was printed at Venice in 1755, and in 1767 an account of his antique gems in two volumes folio, written by Antonio Francesco Gori, was published in the same city under the t.i.tle of _Dactyliotheca Smithiana_. An edition of Boccaccio's _Decamerone_ was brought out by Smith in 1729.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 68: _Dictionary of National Biography._]

DR. RICHARD RAWLINSON, 1690-1755