Chapter IX: The Collector’s Best Bet 264 (4)

It is plain, therefore, that the master forger must have his chronology at his finger tips. He should know not only the dates of history, which he can find in any textbook, but he must be familiar with the history of costume, of furnishings, and decorations also. I remember reading the invention of one gentleman’s brain and pen in which he alluded to hoop skirts ten years before they put in their dreadful appearance. The literary forger hoping for success should also acquire an almost endless knowledge of the colloquial language of the period in which he writes, and must be naturally a student of orthography and spelling. In fact, he has taken up the one career where he has literally to mind his P’s and Q’s!

It is fairly easy to imitate the writing of a distinguished character; the most difficult part is to interpret, as well, the thoughts of the equally distinguished mind. A forger of Thackeray wrote the name of the author of _Vanity Fair_ in many volumes, together with a short comment about the text. He composed a pointed criticism of each work, or invented what he believed to be some smart phrase about the author. In this case the signature and the writing itself are so excellent that they almost defy detection, but the thoughts are no more those of the great Thackeray than are mine of Shakespeare.

Not many are privileged to see presentation copies actually in the making. A friend of mine told me of an experience he had in London. One day he strolled into a little bookshop near the British Museum. He looked over some dusty volumes for a time, and finally found one which he wanted to buy. There was no clerk in the front of the shop, so he walked to the rear, where he discovered a little old man seated at a large table. Before him was a row of books all opened at the title pages. The busy old fellow was bent over another and so absorbed in his work that he heard nothing. My friend looked over his shoulder. He was committing a little quiet forgery! In other words he was caught in “fragrant delectation.” On the title page he was painstakingly forming Lewis Carroll’s autograph. Before my friend left he had an opportunity to see what was written. He found, much to his astonishment, that the old gentleman was inditing to long-deceased friends of Lewis Carroll, copies of _Alice in Wonderland_, each one with an appropriate inscription. When asked the reason for all this industry, he replied, “I am making them for the American market!”

Among the many bugaboos which the forger has to face are watermarks woven into paper. These are the manufacturer’s trade-marks, and often show the date the paper was made. You can see them if you hold the paper to the light. Quite recently I was offered three manuscripts supposed to be in the hand of Oscar Wilde. His exquisite though affected Greek style of handwriting was well enough imitated. But when I pointed out to the man who offered the manuscripts to me that they were written upon paper which bore the watermarks of a manufacturer who had made it during the Great War, he suddenly remembered an appointment and hurriedly made his departure.

About twenty years ago a celebrated French firm of book and autograph dealers cabled my brother Philip that they were offering for sale the original manuscript of Oscar Wilde’s _Salomé_. Wilde, who was a literary exhibitionist if ever there was one, gave _Salomé_ to the world in French, and not such very good French at that. As I had an extensive collection of Wilde autographs even then, I was extremely eager to own the original of this famous work also. Before my reply could reach the firm in France, some luckier collector who was on the spot at the time bought it. I was very much annoyed, but concealed my chagrin as best I could, not even inquiring who the buyer was. I suspected it was some French author. The year before last, when on my annual pilgrimage to England, a French journalist came to see me one day at the Carlton Hotel in London, with the news that he knew the man who owned the _Salomé_ manuscript, and was informed that he would part with it if paid a sufficiently high price.

Now, I am never frightened at high prices. I asked my friend to return to France and buy it for me. Two days passed. Then I received the news that I was again too late. It was plain that Salomé was playing hide and seek with me, and placing my head on a charger. After two months in England I went to Paris. I had hardly arrived before the collector who last purchased _Salomé_ offered to sell it. I asked him to bring it immediately to my hotel. With my nerves on edge, I kept telling myself that this time she should not escape me. Now, the collector in question was supposed to be a judge of autographs. He arrived and took the manuscript from its case. I fairly grabbed it from him, fearing that the evil Salomé would sprout wings and fly out of the window. I opened the cover to the first page, looked at it, turned the second, then the third. Quickly I closed it and gave it back to him. A silence followed during which he regarded me in amazement.

“No, thank you,” I said; “I am looking for Salomé in the flesh, not a will-o’-the-wisp. Your manuscript is a forgery!”

It was plain this poor fellow had been deceived. He walked up and down my room, tearing at his hair in the best French manner, for he had given a good sum for this clever fabrication. I, too, was deeply disappointed, after tracking over Europe for it. Like the villain in the play, Salomé still evaded me.

In Philadelphia a year later I received a cable from a firm of auctioneers in Paris, offering me the original manuscript of _Salomé_ once more. I naturally paid no attention to the offer, thinking it another forgery. I was tired of the wiles of this wicked woman. I had come to the conclusion that this work was not, by some weaving of the fates, for the house of Rosenbach. No more fool’s errands for me.

A few weeks after, when dining with a well-known American collector in New York, he said to me:

“Doctor, I have something which will open even your eyes. I have _Salomé_!”

Naturally, I could not suppress a cynical laugh. “Another forgery?” I smilingly inquired.

After dinner we went to his library, and he pointed very proudly to two old copy books on the table. The moment I looked at the pages I knew that at last I held the original in my hands. How envious I was! But I now realized this manuscript could never be mine. I felt truly heartbroken. My friend, seeing I was not exactly elated over his treasure, but rather downcast, asked the reason. I related the whole story of my chase.

With great generosity he replied, with the air of a sultan presenting a favorite slave, “Doctor, I don’t want to stand in your way. If you want her, she is yours.” He told me its history as far as he knew it; the manuscript had been purchased by Pierre Louÿs, the eminent French poet. It was he who had bought it directly from the shop in Paris when I first tried to obtain it twenty years before. It is far more precious to-day than it was then. Not only is it the greatest work from the pen of Oscar Wilde but it is the one work of his that has been translated into all languages. It has also been used as the libretto by Richard Strauss for his startling and beautiful opera.

The up-to-date literary forger always keeps his eye upon the market. Genuine letters of certain famous, or infamous, men and women will always command high prices. Yet the styles in collecting change as in everything else. One decade there may be a sudden craze for Byron letters; the next, autograph letters or documents pertaining to Keats or Shelley are frantically sought.

So it goes. One cycle begins as another cycle ends. Therefore, forgers’ productions often swarm into the market when the popularity of an autograph is on the crest of the wave. There are certain historical characters whose autographs will always sell at top prices. With this in mind, one of the greatest hoaxes ever planned was, for a time, put over by a French forger a few years after the middle of the nineteenth century. Vrain Lucas was his name, and his guileless customer was a noted mathematician, Michel Chasles. I first knew of Lucas’s wretched forgeries through hearing my uncle Moses tell of them; in a way, it was rather humorous, for when he told me the story he became as enraged as though Lucas had taken him in, rather than Chasles.

Vrain Lucas was a middle-aged man of fair education and rather well read. By his own confession he had manufactured more than twenty-five thousand spurious autographs, many of which he sold to Chasles over a period of eight years. During that time Chasles had doubted his word only once. Lucas immediately offered to buy back everything he had sold him, and thus Chasles’s faith was restored.

This charlatan, Lucas, must have had a certain hypnotic influence over Chasles, plus the assurance and the courage of Old Nick himself. Chasles’s belief in him, however, proved Lucas’s undoing. For when he sold him two letters from Charles V to Rabelais, Chasles, in his excitement and delight, presented them to the Academy of Belgium. The letters for a time were believed to be genuine. Then Lucas came again to Chasles, this time with letters from Pascal to Boyle and Sir Isaac Newton, in which the writer proved that he, and not Newton, had discovered the law of gravitation.

You can imagine how deeply moved was Chasles, the naïve mathematician. He rushed with them to the French Academy of Science, and at once the scientific world was stirred into a commotion. At the height of this agitation Sir David Brewster came forward and announced that the letters must be from the pen of an impostor, proving conclusively at the same time that Newton was a mere child of ten when these pretended messages of Pascal were written. Thus began the beginning of the end for the forger.

Certain testimony given by Chasles at Lucas’s trial before a tribunal of the Seine, in 1870, is almost unbelievable. It seems ridiculous to me that any man, especially a collector, could have been so simple and gullible as was Chasles. He spent 140,000 francs, a lot of money in those days, for a list of autograph letters that is too good to pass over lightly. Although Monsieur Lucas supplied his customer with the important names of the fifteenth, sixteenth, and seventeenth centuries, including Boccaccio, Cervantes, Dante, Racine, Shakespeare, and Spinoza, he likewise delved into the remote past and produced letters from Abélard, Alcibiades, Attila, Julius Cæsar, Charlemagne, Ovid, Pliny, Plutarch, and Pompey!

Lucas was careful enough to mix an ink for his forgeries which, when dry, gave the appearance of age. Then he treated the completed masterpieces in such a way as to make them look worn and of great age. But his cleverness was only half-witted! He had the audacity not only to write these ancient epistles on paper from local mills, which showed the watermarks of Angoulême, but most daringly inscribed them in modern French!

The late Simon Gratz, in his delightful and authoritative volume, _A Book about Autographs_, gives translations of several of these shameless fabrications. Here is the letter which Chasles believed Cleopatra wrote to Julius Cæsar:--

Cleopatra, Queen, to her very beloved Julius Cæsar, Emperor.

MY VERY BELOVED:--

Our son Cæsarion is well. I hope that he will soon be able to support the travel from here to Marseilles, where I need to send him to study, as much for the good air one breathes there as for the fine things which are taught. I beg you will tell me how long you will still remain in that country, for I want myself to take our son there and see you on this occasion. This is to tell you, my very beloved, the pleasure I feel when I am near you, and meanwhile I pray the gods to have you in their guard.

The XI March year of Rome VCCIX

CLEOPATRA

Think with what pious glee Monsieur Chasles read the following priceless letter from Lazarus, the resuscitated, to Saint Peter!

MY DEAR FRIEND PETRUS:--

You tell me you have noticed in the writings of Cæsar and in those of Cicero that one of the most important parts of the Druids’ religion consists in sacrificing savage men. It is true they take in an erroneous sense this principle, that men can only appreciate the life God gave them by offering Him the life of a man. They have continued that inhuman and bloody practice until the time of Cicero. This is why he says they soil and profane their temple and altars by offering there human victims, and here Cicero is right in insulting a worship so barbarous, saying it is a strange thing that to satisfy for what they owe to their religion they must first dishonor it by some murder. They cannot be religious without being homicides. The infamy of this horrible maxim has reflected on all the Gauls, even if it has been practiced only in some places. But the arms and the conquest of the Romans have wiped out this infamy and I do not believe that it is practiced anywhere now. Amen.

This X August XLVII

LAZARUS

Lucas’s interpretation of Biblical characters was rather unusual. Perhaps it was this quality, which so fascinated his generous customer, that caused him to be blind to obvious discrepancies. Here is rather a quaint letter purporting to be from Mary Magdalene to Lazarus:--

MY VERY BELOVED BROTHER:--

That which you tell us of Petrus, the Apostle of our meek Jesus, gives us hope that soon we shall see him here and I dispose myself to receive him well. Our sister Martha also rejoices of it. Her health is very tottering and I fear her passing away. This is why I recommend her to your good prayers. The good girls who have come to place themselves under our guidance are admirable for us and make us the most amiable caresses. It is enough said, my very beloved brother, that our sojourn in these countries of the Gaul pleases us much, that we have no desire to leave it, also none of our friends suggest it. Do you not think that those Gauls who were thought barbarian nations are not at all so, and judging only by what we have learned it must be from these that the light of science started. I have a great desire to see you and beg our Lord may have you in favor.

This X June XLVI

MAGDALENE

In this fourth epistle, written by Alexander the Great, Lucas, the true Frenchman, does not forget once more to let words of flattery for France--Gaul--drip from the pen of the King of Macedonia. This letter follows:--

Alexander Rex to his very beloved Aristotle, Greeting.

MY BELOVED:--

I am not satisfied because you have made public certain of your books which you had to keep under the seal of secrecy, for it is a profanation of their value; and no more render them public without my consent. As to what you asked of me, to travel to the country of the Gauls in order to learn the sciences of the Druids, of whom Pythagoras made so fine a eulogy, not only do I permit you but I entreat you to go for the good of my people, as you are not ignorant in what esteem I hold the nation which I consider as the one that carries the light in the world. I salute you.

This XX of the Kalends of May, year of the CV Olympiad

ALEXANDER

Old Chasles got all that was coming to him, and the 140,000 francs that he spent on the Lucas inventions were as nothing compared with the great joy the world in general, and antiquarians in particular, have experienced in reading these altogether amusing epistles.

Being sometimes called a pirate myself, I have always been interested in reading about them. I remember reveling in _Treasure Island_, soon after it appeared in 1883. But instead of the pieces of eight and flashing gems which Stevenson conjured up for the boyish mind, I substituted, in my youthful imagination, rare books. This seems far-fetched, yet it is absolutely true. Instead of Long John Silver’s doubloons and sequins, I put in their place first editions and manuscripts. They were more to me, then and now, than all the treasure of the Indies. And yet, in the first years of my passion for them, I rarely gave thought to forgeries. I had that superb reliance upon instinct which is a part and parcel of youth. I felt that if there were forgeries about I could sniff them as a dog follows a scent. So I was not really interested in forgers and their works until I read in a book for the first time an account of William Henry Ireland, the greatest fabricator of them all.

Ireland was a youthful scamp, less than eighteen years old, who in 1795 pulled the leg of almost the entire literary world with his “discovery” of many Shakespearean manuscripts. He was the son of an engraver in London, and doubtless inherited the facile fingers which brought him his peculiar fame. Ireland senior reverenced all relics of antiquity, and especially those which were connected with the memory of Shakespeare. He was almost a fanatic on this subject and gave his son to understand that his greatest desire would be satisfied the day that he was lucky enough to find an autograph manuscript of the Bard of Avon. I’ve had that feeling myself. After being dragged hither and yon by his father, who searched every nook and cranny where Shakespeare was supposed to have stayed, the filial William Henry decided upon a course of his own to make his father completely happy.

He was apprenticed at the time to an attorney, and it was a part of his daily work to study ancient documents, such as leases and wills. He sometimes read in books the histories of various estates in Great Britain, and occasionally a facsimile of Shakespeare’s signature was printed in them. One day he came across some unused parchment at the end of an old rent roll. His imagination began to work, I suppose, as he studied the Shakespeare facsimile before him, and the echoes of old deeds, with their quaint phrases, doubtless rang in his ears. Thus he set about practising the penmanship of an earlier era. Finding that he wrote with amazing ease, he immediately made up a lease between William Shakespeare and John Heminge, with one Michael Fraser and Elizabeth, his wife. When the ink was sufficiently dried he took it home to his father, who at the sight of it nearly dropped dead with joy. And so began young Ireland’s notorious performances.

After finding further facsimiles of signatures of the Elizabethan period, he invented, with the most appalling facility, all sorts of letters and poems. Naturally, his father and others asked where he had found these remarkable manuscripts, whereupon he made up a more or less logical story. He said he had met a gentleman of fortune, whose name he had sworn not to tell, in a coffeehouse in London, and that in the course of conversation they had discovered each other’s love for things antique. The new acquaintance then mentioned having in his possession a collection of old deeds and papers tied in bundles. The boy told of his delight at being asked to inspect them; and how he had gone to his friend’s house and searched through them. Much to their mutual joy, he had discovered one old paper which clearly established his friend’s right to a certain property which had been the subject of litigation for a long time. This friend, he went on to explain, first swore him to secrecy, then presented him with as many of these ancient manuscripts as he wished to have.

It is not difficult to understand why William Henry’s father accepted his boy’s story so easily. Remember, those were the days of stern virtues. A son brought up to respect his parents was expected to tell the truth. When the elder Ireland, being a man of substantial reputation, showed the manuscripts to his friends and repeated his son’s story, it was accepted. Spurred on by his apparent success in deceiving his father and many visitors, the young forger began to lose his head and daily grew more daring. Under cover of secrecy, in a lonely room where he was apprenticed, he had the temerity not only to forge Shakespeare’s signature to documents but to invent an autograph confession of faith for him. This met with success, and he proceeded to compose love lyrics in the form of letters to Anne Hathaway, signed with the name of the great poet.

Here is one of them, in which he inclosed a lock of “thye Willys” hair. It is addressed to Anna Hatherrewaye, and reads as follows:--

DEARESSTE ANNA:--

As thou haste alwaye founde mee toe mye Worde moste trewe soe thou shalt see I have stryctlye kepte mye promyse I praye you perfume thys mye poore Locke withe thye balmye Eysses forre thenne indeede shalle Kynges themmeselves bowe ande pay homage toe itte I doe assure thee no rude hande hathe knottedde itte thye Willys alone hathe done the worke Neytherre the gyldedde bawble thatte envyronnes the heade of Majestye noe norre honourres moste weyghtye wulde give mee halfe the joye as didde thysse mye lyttle worke forre thee The feelinge thatte dydde neareste approache untoe itte was thatte whiche commethe nygheste untoe God meeke and Gentle Charytye forre thatte Virrtue O Anna doe I love doe I cheryshe thee inne mye hearte forre thou arte ass a talle Cedarre stretchynge forthe its branches ande succourynge smaller Plants fromme nyppynge Winneterre orr the boysterouse Wyndes Farewelle toe Morrowe bye tymes I wille see thee tille thenne Adewe sweete Love

Thyne everre

WM SHAKSPEARE

ANNA HATHERREWAYE

Sometime later he made an almost entire transcript of _Lear_, and a few leaves from _Hamlet_, too! In _Hamblette_, as he quaintly called it, he boldly introduced variations in the text, which many of the most learned men of the time read without doubting their authenticity. Boswell, Doctor Johnson’s famous biographer, called at the Ireland home one day, inspected the manuscripts, then knelt down before them, enthusiastically kissing a paper here and there as he thanked God for letting him live to see them.

However, there was one doubting Thomas, who refused to believe, almost from the beginning of the “discoveries,” that there was an iota of truth concerning their origin. His name was Edmund Malone. He was the one literary critic who did not make a fool of himself at any time during a controversy which later developed to a furious pitch, and resulted in a full published confession from Ireland.

Young Ireland’s final burst of inspiration led him to write a pretended play of Shakespeare, entitled _Vortigern and Rowena_. This was the straw which eventually broke the camel’s back, but not until Sheridan had produced it, with two of the foremost players of the day, John Philip Kemble and Mrs. Jordan, appearing in the leading rôles.

Ireland appealed to me, not because he was a forger but because of a certain further cleverness. When he was discovered and his misdeeds revealed to a curious world, there suddenly sprang up a great demand to behold the handiwork of this delectable young villain. People in England, and collectors and curio seekers everywhere, wanted to own specimens of his fraudulent but interesting papers. They were so much in demand that he was kept busy from morning to night making forgeries of his own forgeries.

The sudden demand was not for Shakespeare’s own letter to Anne Hathaway but for Ireland’s original imaginary manuscript. What, then, could the poor fellow do? He just had to sit himself down and ply his trade as long as his supply of old paper and precious ink held out.

It was these humorous and at the same time dramatic facts which touched my imagination as a collector. I wanted Ireland’s original forgeries, not his double and triple fabrications. I naturally wanted the original manuscript of _Vortigern_, the one the lovely Mrs. Jordan had reverently held in her adoring--and adorable--hands. I thought I knew where they were--in the collection of the Marquis of Blandford, to whom they were sold many years ago. Imagine my surprise when I purchased the library of Marsden J. Perry, of Providence, to discover in his world-famed collection the actual forgeries not only of _Vortigern_ but of _King Lear_ and _Hamlet_ as well. Here were the original documents which had deceived some of the choicest minds in England. Looking further, I also found the first draft of Ireland’s confession. I have the actual drafts with which Richard Brinsley Sheridan was so delighted; the very pages from which Kemble studied the part of Vortigern, and before which Boswell knelt, “a tumbler of warm brandy and water” at his side.

Ireland was not the first spectacular forger of tender years. In his confession he speaks of having been influenced by reading of Thomas Chatterton’s career. Chatterton was an English youth who kept the literary world titillating twenty-five years earlier. It is a strange thing, this psychologic kink which sometimes forms in the brains of very young men. Why they should risk bringing the world about their ears through impersonating the famous dead, when they have brains and originality of their own, no one knows.

Poor Chatterton! His is the only great genius which has come to light through the art of forgery. He began writing when he was sixteen, and almost from the beginning produced some of the finest poetry in the history of eighteenth-century literature. Perhaps he was unhappily shy, as boys often are at that age; or he may have suffered from some gloomy mental obsession. His manner of screening his identity when these remarkable poems first appeared has caused many a student to pause and wonder.

Chatterton’s first writings appeared with an accompanying explanation. He said his father had found them years before in an ancient chest belonging to the Church of St. Mary Redcliffe at Bristol. The verses were supposed to have been composed by Thomas Rowley, a monk who had lived in that neighborhood during the fifteenth century. Chatterton, according to his story, had merely copied them. At first, this story was accepted, while critics praised the undeniable beauty of the lines. Then some contemporary littérateur called attention to the incorrect usage of Anglo-Saxon words of Rowley’s day, and suspicion hovered over Chatterton. It was soon charged that Chatterton had written the poems of Rowley, using a certain dictionary from which he chose Anglo-Saxon words in order to create the atmosphere and flavor of antiquity.

Among his critics were Horace Walpole and his two poet friends, Mason and Gray. The boy was accused of downright forgery when it was further noted that the poem which Chatterton brought out as the “Battle of Hastings wrote by Turgot the Monk, in the tenth century, and translated by Thomas Rowlie,” was wrongly dated. This bit of carelessness on Chatterton’s part increased the hue and cry of ridicule. The Battle of Hastings, as every English schoolboy knew, did not take place until the eleventh century! And here the poetic Turgot was relating its history one century before it happened. The goading of Walpole and his acolytes finally drove Chatterton to commit suicide when he was only eighteen years of age.

What a loss it was to England!

Walpole, seated in his comfortable library at Strawberry Hill, surrounded by his precious books and his precious ladies, recognized Chatterton’s works as forgeries, but did not recognize his superb genius. A few of the inspired lines of Chatterton’s poems are worth all the famous letters which Walpole so elegantly wrote for a large public, including himself. Although we wade with zest in the delightful mud stream that, with its scandal and veiled allusions, runs so naughtily through Walpole’s correspondence, we can never forgive his treatment of poor Chatterton.

Not quite in the same class as a forgery, a quaint and equally difficult sister art has gradually sprung into existence, called the facsimile page. Not that I mean to imply that the making of such pages is always done with an intent to deceive. There is a concern in London which supplies missing pages on order for any book you may have--a business that is done quite openly. Suppose you own a copy of the first edition of one of Shakespeare’s folios, in which either the title or last leaf is missing. If you don’t happen to be too fastidious and have merely the collector’s love for the complete, without his obsession for the perfect as well, you could take your first folio to this firm and in a short time receive a perfect page made to match the others of your book. Only the connoisseur and you yourself would know the difference.

Owing to the assistance of the camera to-day and the modern processes of engraving, it is not difficult to reproduce the printed word as it first appeared several centuries ago. The snag comes, however, in finding a paper that is exactly contemporaneous with the book itself. This London house happens to have a large and wonderful collection of old papers, taken chiefly from the flyleaves of early volumes. There are many unscrupulous dealers in the world, even in New York, who do not acknowledge to their customers that a book which they offer as genuine is made up in this manner. Any reputable firm would immediately call attention to it. One not quite so particular, with the naïveté of a child, always pleads, when caught, that he was ignorant of the guilty leaf, not being an expert himself. And yet he had ordered the damning page from the London house of facsimiles.

But sometimes it is almost impossible to tell which leaves in a book are facsimile. About seventy-five years ago there was an expert in this line in England by the name of Harris. With the greatest dexterity and cunning, he made leaves for incomplete books, which exactly duplicated the original ones. In those days such work was tedious and had to be accomplished entirely by hand, as it was long before the era of modern photographs. Harris’s work was in constant demand. An amusing story is told among booksellers of an order Harris executed for a celebrated collector whose copy of Caxton’s _History of Troy_ had two leaves missing. Five years later the collector called on Harris. He took this Caxton from his pocket and showed it to him. It was with the greatest difficulty that Harris himself could determine which two leaves were his. In fact, he had to verify them by his records.

If there are great holes or tears in old pages they can be filled in in such a marvelous manner as almost to defy detection. Here again the literary detective enters to discover a clew and solve the mystery. The fellow must have a specialized sense for this sort of thing, just as a born newspaperman has a nose for news. The true literary detective will tell you at a glance if anything is wrong with a printed page. This is a rare faculty, and in the book business amounts almost to genius. Some booksellers are never able to tell, during their entire careers, which are facsimile leaves and which aren’t. Only a few are adept at it.

Another trick is to supply original covers when they are missing from old and precious volumes. Sometimes a copy of an English classic appears in the auction room minus its blue or gray or yellow paper wrappers. In the twinkling of an eye brand-new ones are supplied, aged by the miraculous antiquer, and offered as being in pristine, immaculate state, “very rare in its original paper binding.”

Then, to enhance the illusion, an old signature is added to the cover and perhaps the price, “tuppence,” written in an old hand. It takes Sherlock Holmes himself to detect these impostures.

I know a gentleman in London who is so expert in detecting forgeries that he goes on a scent like a setter after a bird. But the real safeguard for the collector is to buy his books, not from the transient individual who has two or three bargains to offer, but from the man who is known first of all for his reputable dealing. Then collecting is sheer delight.

V

AMONG OLD MANUSCRIPTS

The First Folio had lain idly at anchor for two long, sultry days. Then, as a miniature gale swept the threatening clouds of a summer storm across Corson’s Inlet just before twilight on the second day, I bowed to the will of the fisherman’s god, whoever he may be, and hurried down the beach. Ordinarily I am not the sort of fisherman who waits for the psychological moment, but here it was upon me. After such weather, fish were sure to strike.

As I rowed out to my boat, I heard the telephone bell ring in the house I had just left. It had been an exhausting week for me; every bibliomaniac in the vicinity of Philadelphia had had a book to show and sell me, and my office had telephoned upon the slightest provocation. So when I heard that bell I pulled for the First Folio as though the devil were after me, and carefully rounding the bow, drew up on the port side away from the shore. Once aboard, the captain started the engine and made for the open sea. Even then I could not avoid seeing my man Harrison waving frantically from the beach.

Only the born Izaak Walton knows that lazy defiance of the world’s demands which comes with a rod and reel in one’s hand. Soon I was fishing; forgotten was the realm of books and manuscripts, forgotten the boring persistence of telephone bells, forgotten poor Harrison on the shore--forgotten everything in the world except the delight of a strike, the thrilling moments of playing my catch, and the breath-taking suspense of reeling in. How long I fished I don’t know. The sun emerged again in time to set, as the wind died out completely. I refuse to tell the number of fish I caught, for no one would believe me; but with the advent of a fine six-pounder I felt quite satisfied. I walked to a low deck chair and sat, resting. Perhaps I dozed for a few minutes; I don’t know. Suddenly I heard my name. I opened my eyes and was surprised to find the shore close by. We had forgotten to anchor and were drifting in.

“Doctah--doctah!” Harrison’s voice lost its slow drawl in excitement. “Mistah Lawlah done phone all dis afternoon! Why fo’ you don’ answah me, doctah? He say he done fin’ ole Mistah Franklin’s work book.”

How often had hopeful bookmen dreamed of one day discovering this work book of Benjamin Franklin! From my earliest days of collecting, I myself had persistently followed all rumors or clews concerning its whereabouts. None of them led anywhere. I even doubted that it still existed.

“Harrison,” I replied, “you can tell Mr. Lawler that I am not exactly partial to a fool’s errand on a hot day. Besides, I want to fish.” He went indoors, shouted my words over the telephone, then bolted down to the shore again.

“Oh, Lawdy, doctah, do come to de telephone! He sho am mad if you don’t.”

When I reached the house I explained once more to the manager of my Philadelphia place that I wished to be left alone to fish.

“Fish!” Mr. Lawler’s tone was derisive. “Why, if you’ll take the next train and meet me in Camden, I’ll show you where you can land a fish bigger than anything you could ever pull out of Corson’s Inlet!” This was bait for me, if not for the fish, and I asked for fuller information.

It seemed that after months of patient search Mr. Lawler had located the proprietor of an antique shop at Mount Holly, New Jersey, who owned an old copy book which he claimed was the original in which Franklin kept his accounts. Mr. Lawler had already seen it, and believed it to be authentic; and though I rather dreaded being disappointed once more, there was the chance of a find. I left for the station immediately; there I found no train due for hours. This was doubtless just the obstacle I needed to egg me on. I quickly hired an automobile and motored the seventy miles to Camden. Mr. Lawler met me. He seemed nervous and in a great hurry to make the final lap of our pilgrimage. We had twenty miles farther to go, and as we sped along we discussed the printer’s long-lost work book.

Franklin had mentioned its existence in various writings and letters. He had said that when he was a printer he kept all the records of his business in it.

At last we came to Mount Holly, and as we followed a quiet country street to its end I regretted the trip. The heat of the summer night was oppressive, and the entrance of the shop before which we stopped was the same as a thousand others scattered over the country. A dull light reflected against the usual sign, “Antiques,” hanging above the doorway. As I entered, a sensation of futility came over me. The rosewood whatnots holding their bits and pieces of glass or china depressed me; broken-down Windsors, old ships’ lanterns, hooked rugs, maple chests, and mahogany bureaus--was this atmosphere conducive to hope? I doubted it, and looked at Mr. Lawler with an accusatory eye. But so great was his excitement now that he had forgotten my existence. Suddenly his face lighted.

The proprietor of the shop, a calm, middle-aged man, came forward. He greeted me, smiling kindly. I must confess this smile revived hope. He seemed sure of himself in a quiet sort of way. I began to think that perhaps I hadn’t come on such a wild-goose chase after all. He was at his desk now, an old desk littered with papers. As his fingers searched through them I watched closely. Then, when he finally drew a long narrow book from beneath a pile of letters, I caught my breath.

I took it from him and went to the dim light. As I opened the battered covers I immediately recognized the work book of “the first civilized American,” as a recent biographer has so aptly called him. Not a page had been tampered with; it was entirely as it had been kept for Franklin, except that it was somewhat yellowed by its hundred and eighty years of age. Very carefully he had listed each work printed by his press. The title of every book, the number of copies made, and the quality of paper used, all commercial details, the costs and selling prices, were methodically written out. Other expenses, too, were set down.

I looked at Mr. Lawler gratefully, and he, inwardly gloating, acted as though the finding of historically invaluable account books was all in an evening’s work. Of course, I could not leave without it, and I lost no time in buying it from the owner. Ten minutes later two jubilant bookmen climbed into the waiting automobile outside, making a triumphal exit as they carried off their treasure from the town of Mount Holly.

It was impossible to realize, when I purchased it, the full historical worth of Franklin’s account book. Not until I returned home, where I found leisure to study every word, to compare the contents with published facts concerning Franklin, did I recognize its true import and value to all students of printing in this country. But how did it happen to be in Mount Holly after all those years? This question obsessed me for a long time. The former owner, from whom I purchased it, could tell me nothing. I began searching through the records of Franklin’s career as a printer, and found he was in business with David Hall until 1766, at which time they dissolved their partnership. Then it was that he requested his great friend, James Parker, a noted printer in New York, to audit the accounts for him. Later Parker moved to Burlington, New Jersey, probably taking this account book with him. As Burlington is but a few miles from Mount Holly, it is not difficult to imagine how it might have been carried there by some one of Parker’s descendants.

Many people imagine they own things of great worth, especially if these things are old. They become excited when they run across a letter in some trunk which has not been opened for years. They are sure they have found the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. They are severely shocked, however, when the experienced dealer’s appraisal of the ancestral letters is extremely low. Indeed, the dealer is quite different from the law courts of England, which consider a man innocent until he is proved guilty. Every expert is more or less suspicious of any proffered autograph, especially if the so-called originals are supposed to have been written by celebrated figures of a century or so ago.

The false scent and the fruitless hunt, these the skillful buyer learns to avoid. Sometimes the letters are genuine--sometimes! But it is amazing, too, what tales otherwise honest men and women will fabricate in their eagerness to sell an autograph letter or document. They will swear to heaven that they remember that auspicious day, “over forty years ago, when I was but a mere child,” when the letter was first shown them. I have had many such experiences. Several times I have recognized straight forgeries, letters which were actually written quite recently, and clumsily made to appear old and important. However, there are times when one is due for a delightful surprise. What you believe to be idle vaporings turn out to be something delightfully different.

One day some years ago an old gentleman called upon me in New York. I happened to be walking through my reception room when he arrived, and did not catch his name. But in deference to his extreme age--he appeared to be more than ninety--I immediately invited him into the library. He was very plainly dressed, almost dingy in appearance. I entered into conversation with him and he seemed remarkably well informed. Every celebrity of the past sixty years he appeared to know intimately. We talked of prominent literary figures, of great political and financial leaders. He knew them all!

He even told me of an incident which occurred one evening at Windsor Castle when he dined with Queen Victoria. I looked at him queryingly, deploring that exaggerated ego which is the pleasure and consolation of old age. He continued with anecdotes of Palmerston, Gladstone, Disraeli, and Lord Salisbury. Lincoln had been his friend, he said, as well as all the Presidents from Lincoln’s time; and every corner and crevice of the White House was known to him. I thought to myself that here was certainly an old liar, if ever there was one. A regular Baron Munchausen!

Then I naturally turned the conversation to old books and manuscripts. I mentioned a famous volume, and he said he owned it. I mentioned another; he owned that too! If he had been a younger man I should have had it clearly understood that I no longer cared to be taken for a credulous fool. But being a Philadelphian, of course I could not resist mentioning Benjamin Franklin. The syllables of his name had hardly left my lips when my visitor announced, with something of regret in his voice, that he had once owned the manuscript of Franklin’s famous _Autobiography_!

With unbelieving amazement I stared at him. Then it dawned upon me that the gentleman before me was a distinguished American diplomat and everything he said was the truth! As Minister to France many years ago, he had handled with extraordinary tact several serious political situations; one time editor of the _New York Evening Post_, he was also an essayist and historian. I leaned forward and said in a voice which made no attempt to disguise either my surprise or my pleasure, “Have I the honor of addressing the Honorable John Bigelow?”

Mr. Bigelow then told me how in an off moment he had been induced to sell, at what was then considered a high price, but which would be a mere trifle now, the immortal _Autobiography_ of Benjamin Franklin. He disposed of it through a New York firm of booksellers to E. Dwight Church of Brooklyn, and it is now in that bookman’s paradise, the library of Mr. Henry E. Huntington, at San Marino, California.

Speaking of manuscripts recalls a rather pretty story of how I unexpectedly secured an autograph essay by a favorite modern.

I remember one day in London, when I was calling upon my dear friend, H. W. Massingham, the beloved editor of the _Nation_. His editorial offices in Adelphi Terrace were directly beneath George Bernard Shaw’s apartments in the same old Georgian building. Knowing he was a good friend of Shaw, I asked if he had any of his manuscripts. Massingham looked at me oddly for a moment, as though my request had brought to his mind an entirely new train of thought, then replied, “Oh, yes!” He ran his hand to the bottom of an enormous waste-paper basket under his desk; it was filled to overflowing, as though it had not been emptied for days. He drew out a manuscript which he had thrown away, written in a familiar hand--Shaw’s article on the censorship of the press! He offered it to me as a present, and you will well understand that I accepted it eagerly. This little story should delight Bernard Shaw himself.

To-day it is unfortunate that almost all manuscripts are typed. There are, however, rare exceptions. The late Joseph Conrad was one of the very few authors who worked almost entirely in longhand. When I bought the manuscript of his book, _Victory_, at the Quinn sale in New York in 1924, I paid the highest price--$8100--ever given at auction for the manuscript of a living author. It was closely written on sheets that fill two bulky cases.

The average writer nowadays, after he has corrected the final draft of his work, has it copied by a competent stenographer and then makes any further correction on it he wishes. Many writers find it easier to create their stories directly upon the typewriter, while others dictate. The typewriter--what a curse it has become to the collector! A century from now it will be almost impossible to find the original autograph manuscripts of writers of to-day who stand the test of time. Who knows but that the styles will have changed, and the machine upon which a masterpiece was brought to life will be considered even more precious!

No one knows exactly why there is hardly a scrap left of the original manuscripts of most of the writers of the Elizabethan period. Perhaps publishers in those days had one fault that is prevalent to-day. They may have been too close to their writers to be able to appreciate the value of the original draft, or perhaps they had scrap baskets like Massingham’s. Of Shakespeare’s writing only six or seven signatures are known, and these are attached to his will and other legal documents. They are priceless, and have been kept with great care at Somerset House and at the Record Office in London. How unfortunate it is that not a single line of his original work remains. What would collectors not give now for just one page of _Hamlet_, or even a short note in Shakespeare’s own handwriting! Surely, $500,000 would not be too much. Nor is there any manuscript left of either of his noted contemporaries, Christopher Marlowe and Robert Greene. Of these two, who opened the way for the greatest dramatist of all time, not even a signature remains. I was successful this year, however, in obtaining a letter of John Fletcher, who very probably collaborated with Shakespeare in the writing of _Henry VIII._ Fletcher addressed this rhymed epistle to the Countess of Huntingdon. For years it had been in an old English muniment room neglected and unsung; and it is really the nearest approach to Shakespeare I have been fortunate enough to find. When you think that hitherto not a signature of Fletcher’s had been known, it makes this find the more remarkable. There are, however, many relics of his great contemporary, Ben Jonson, early drafts of his celebrated plays, and many books are known in which he inscribed comments and notes.

THE
Historie of Troylus
and Cresseida.

_As it was acted by the Kings Maiesties_
seruants at the Globe.

_Written by_ William Shakespeare.

LONDON
Imprinted by _G. Eld_ for _R Bonian_ and _H. Walley_, and
are to be sold at the spred Eagle in Paules
Church-yeard, ouer against the
great North doore.
1609.

ONLY UNCUT SHAKESPEARE QUARTO KNOWN, PUBLISHED IN SHAKESPEARE’S LIFETIME]

I have always been deeply interested in all that remains of the literary lights of the Elizabethan era, and especially in Edmund Spenser, another of the great masters of Shakespeare’s magnificent day.

Last year, when I was crossing to England on the Berengaria, another bookseller, truly a friendly enemy, met me on deck one morning, and by way of greeting, said: “Speaking of association copies, what would you give to own a presentation copy of the first edition of _The Faerie Queene_?”

“Why talk nonsense?” I replied. “It’s impossible. It doesn’t exist.” About two weeks later an eminent scholar who has made many great and outstanding discoveries in early English literature called at my hotel to see me, and invited me to go with him to inspect his fine collection. He spoke of one book in particular, which he was sure would interest me, but purposely neglected to say what it was. I arrived at his home and had hardly got beyond the front door when he placed in my hands a volume in its original binding of old calf. It was Spenser’s own copy of _The Faerie Queene_, dated 1590, with an inscription in his handwriting on the title page in Greek: “From the author to himself.” He had also presented this volume to Elizabeth Boyle, whom he married four years later. On a blank page toward the back of the book he gallantly wrote in French, “A sa mistresse,” and under this elegant heading had inscribed the complete first sonnet from his glorious _Amoretti_, beginning:--

Happy ye leaves when as those lilly Hands
That houlds my life in hir dead-doing might,
Shall handle you and hold in Love’s swete bandes
Like captives trembling at ye victors sight.

The _Amoretti_ was not published until five years later, in 1595.

As I stood looking at _The Faerie Queene_ I became quite speechless with surprise and delight, as no other presentation copy of Spenser was known to me. Almost before I could regain my equilibrium my host handed me another, a smaller volume. This was bound in old vellum, a quaint little English travel book. With a gasp I read upon the title page a presentation address to Gabriel Harvey, the poet’s dearest friend, and incidentally, the bitter literary enemy of Ben Jonson. It read: “The gift of Edmund Spenser, clerk to the Archbishop of Rochester, 1578.” What enhanced its preciousness was that Harvey had made notes throughout, commenting upon his happy friendship with Spenser. After such a startling introduction to his collection, I looked upon my friend, this learned book lover, with even greater admiration than before; and if he had further offered me a presentation copy of _Hamlet_ I should not have been amazed. To-day these marvelous mementos of the Elizabethan era are treasured among the outstanding volumes in my library.

One week later my friend the American bookseller called upon me at the Carlton Hotel in London.

“Hello,” I began. “You’re just the man I want to see. I’ve found a presentation copy of _The Faerie Queene_.”

“You unholy liar,” he said, not knowing whether to believe me or not.

“Yes,” I replied; “it is at your hand.” His hands trembled as he lifted the book from the table, and I could see his face change color as he read the magic lines in Spenser’s autograph.