'The history of books,' it has often been said, 'is as curious and instructive as that of men: it is therein that we have to seek for the moral life of a people.' This remark has very much the character of a truism, and more especially at the present period. The ever-circling course of time brings phenomena in literature as well as astronomy: from the no-book era the world passed into the too-many-book era; from that of reading nothing but what pleased a few, to that in which everybody read what they pleased; from that of being punished for reading, to that in which the punishment was for not reading. Nodier says, 'Printed books have existed but little more than four hundred years, and yet, in certain countries, they have already accumulated to such a degree as to peril the old equilibrium of the globe. Civilisation has reached the most unexpected of its periods—the Age of Paper.'

We have had the Golden Age, and the Age of Brass, and of Iron; but the Age of Paper!—was such a wonder ever dreamt of by philosophy? What does it bode? Is it synonymous with flimsy age? Do the centuries degenerate? According to M. Victor Hugo they do not. In his reception-speech made to the AcadÉmie in 1840, he declared, 'Nothing has degenerated; France is always the torch of nations. The epoch is great—great by its science, its eloquence, its industry, great by its poetry and its art. At the present hour, there is but one enlightened and living literature in the whole universe—and it is the literature of France.' It is not easy to account for differences of opinion, but only three short years earlier—namely, in 1837—Monsieur Guizot affirmed, in addressing another learned academy, 'The true and disinterested worship of science has worn itself out among us; we seek for noise or for profit, for a prompt satisfaction of self-love, or for a material advantage.'

Contrast this with the period when pen, ink, and fingers did the work now done by type and power-presses—the no-book era. Not the least noteworthy among patient transcribers were the Benedictines. 'Their rule assigned an eminent rank among monastic virtues to the guardianship and multiplication of valuable manuscripts. It taught the copyist of a holy book to think of himself as at once a pupil and a teacher—as a missionary while seated at his desk—using each finger as a tongue—inflicting on the Spirit of Evil a deadly wound at each successive line—and as baffling, with the pen, the dread enemy who smiles at the impotent hostility of every other weapon grasped by the hand of mortal man. In each Benedictine monastery a chamber was set apart for the discharge of this sacred office. In this Scriptorium some of the monks plied their pens assiduously, and in profound silence, to produce faultless transcripts of the best originals. To others was committed the care of revising the text of such works as were then held in the highest esteem. Charlemagne himself assigned to the Benedictine Alcuin the high office of preparing, from the various sources within his reach, a perfect Codex of the Holy Scriptures. For what remains to us of Pliny, Sallust, and Macrobius, and for the orations against Verres, we are indebted to their literary zeal.'

We read of Claude Estiennot, who was procurator of the Benedictines at Rome during the papacy of Innocent XI., that 'within eleven years he had collected and transcribed forty-five bulky folios, at the various libraries of his society in the several dioceses of France, adding to them, says Dom le Cerf, "rÉflexions trÈs sensÉes et judicieuses"—"very sensible and judicious reflections."' Forty-five volumes in eleven years! Perhaps this was a commendable result in the eighth century, but the old-fashioned hand-press in the village of Dumdrudge would beat it now-a-days, barring probably the 'judicious reflections.' We have before us a statement of the books and pamphlets printed in France in fifteen years—1830-1845—including reprints, but omitting periodicals, the number was 5862 annually, or a total of 87,930. Estimating each work as two volumes and a-half, they amount to 220,000; and reckoning 1200 copies of each work (a moderate calculation), the grand total is 264,000,000 of volumes.

Nodier might well say the earth's equilibrium is imperilled: and if we add to the above the typographical labours of other countries! In the matter of Bibles alone, the British Societies have distributed 20,000,000 copies since 1827. A house in Paris published the Scriptures in three quarto volumes, price seventy-five francs, in twelve years—1824-1836: by dint of canvassing, and offering the work from house to house, they sold 65,000 copies, value 4,875,000 francs. Nor are we without monuments of individual effort: Daniel Kieffer, a celebrated Protestant and learned Orientalist of Strasburg, translated the Old Testament into Turkish; and in one year, 1832, distributed at his sole charge 160,000 of the volumes. The best Bohemian dictionary yet published is the work of a M. Jungmann, who prepared and brought it out at his own cost, and sold a vineyard to defray the expense. According to Mr Kohl, Bibles are smuggled into Bohemia, Scripture is contraband, and yet, contradictory as it may seem, Bibles may be sold in that country, although they may not be printed there or imported. The copies which do find an entrance are sent mostly from Berlin and England. A few years since, two wagon-loads fell into the hands of customhouse officers, who have ever since kept the prize safely under lock and key. In the public library at Linz, the above-named traveller saw an old edition of Luther's works thickly coated with dust, and was informed by the attendant that the volumes had not once been disturbed for thirty years.

Even in the days when oligarchs prescribed the popular reading, Pasquin dared to say what he thought of their proceedings. Father Germain, who accompanied Mabillon to Rome in 1685, relates an incident:—'He found Rome agitated with the affair of the Quietists. His account of the dispute is rather facetious than theological. Just then a Spaniard had been sent to the galleys, and a priest to the gallows; the first for talking, the second for writing scandals; while the great Quietist Molinos was in the custody of the Inquisition. Marforio, says Germain, is asked by Pasquin, why are you leaving Rome? and answers, "He who speaks is sent to the galleys; he who writes is hanged; he who remains quiet goes to the Holy Office." Marforio had good cause for his heresy; for the scandal which (as Germain pleasantly has it) "broke the priest's neck" was merely his having said that the "mare had knocked the snail out of its shell," in allusion to the fact of the Pope's having been forced out of his darling seclusion and repose, to be present at a certain festival, at which a mare or palfrey was also an indispensable attendant. The rogues continue to repeat the jest notwithstanding, observes the reverend looker-on.'

'Many men, many minds;' so runs the adage. About the year 1839, a work, 'Le mariage au point de vue chrÉtien' was published by Madame Gasparin. The French Academy awarded a prize to the authoress for her book, but at the very same time it was inscribed by the church in the Index Expurgatorius as a prohibited treatise: such being one among the innumerable instances of difference of opinion. The disappointment of writers, too, would fill a long catalogue: there are extravagant expectations in literature as well as in mines and railways. In 1836, one M. ChÂtel published the 'Code de l'humanitÉ,' which was to regenerate society. He announced himself as Primate of the Gauls, drew around him a few disciples, who remained faithful during fifteen years, when the delusion came suddenly to an end—the primate had become a postmaster.

Some books, like human beings, come into the world with fortune for their nurse, others encounter difficulties at the very outset, and barely escape strangulation. According to Pliny, several thousand men were placed at the service of Aristotle during the time that his great work was in preparation, to furnish him with information and observations on all sorts of natural objects—men whose business it was to take care of cattle, fishing-grounds, and apiaries. The monarch under whose auspices it was composed gave him 800 talents (L.79,000) towards the expenses. Was ever a book brought out under more favourable circumstances?

When Amari wrote his history of Sicily, he submitted it to the censorship at Palermo, and obtained leave to publish. The permission from some cause was, however, revoked before the work appeared, and the author received orders to send the whole of the copies to the police. Unwilling to make such a sacrifice, he packed the books in a case, and shipped them on board a French vessel, and at the same time sent a similar case to the authorities filled with vegetables and rubbish. He then, with a false passport, sailed for Marseilles, and eventually published his book at Paris with the imprint 'Palermo' on the title-page. It has since gone through a second edition.

Some writers have said the inventing of a title, or composing of a preface, cost them more trouble or thought than any other part of their work; it might not be unfair to suppose that the subject-matter was very indifferent, or the preface very good. True it is, however, that many books do exhibit strange freaks of invention on the part of their authors, as a few specimens will exemplify. In 'The Arte of Vulgar Arithmeticke,' published in 1600 by Thomas Hylles, we find 'the partition of a shilling into his aliquot parts' thus exhibited:—

Schoolboys of the present day often chant a quatrain without a suspicion that young scholars vented their discontent in the same doggerel in the days when the invincible Armada was approaching our shores. Professor De Morgan mentions a manuscript, date 1570, in which these lines occur:—

In 1688, a teacher of arithmetic, W. Leybourn, doubtless thought he had made a hit by his title-page, which is thus fancifully arranged:—

Another, of the same date, thought he had discovered an original method for obtaining the square and cube roots, and says—

There was a struggle to live even a hundred years ago; we do not find that being a century nearer to the Golden Age than we are made much essential difference in men's characters:—The author of 'Arithmetick in Epitome,' published in 1740, entertains a professional jealousy of interlopers, for he observes, 'When a man has tried all Shifts, and still failed, if he can but scratch out anything like a fair Character, though never so stiff and unnatural, and has got but Arithmetick enough in his Head to compute the Minutes in a Year, or the Inches in a Mile, he makes his last Recourse to a Garret, and, with the Painter's Help, sets up for a Teacher of Writing and Arithmetick; where, by the Bait of low Prices, he perhaps gathers a Number of Scholars.'

Another, named Chappell, indulges in a little political illustration in his book, published in 1798—was he a disappointed place-hunter? He tells us in his versified tables—

The latter being an allusion to Wilkes' notorious No. 45 of the North Briton.

Some curious facts with respect to old systems of arithmetic were published at a meeting of the Schlesische Gesellschaft in Breslau in 1846. On that occasion Herr LÖschke gave an account to the learned assembly of an old arithmetical work, 'Rechnen auf der Linie,' by the 'old Reckon-master,' Adam Rise. Adam was born about 1492; of his education nothing is known; he lived at Annaberg, and had three sons, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. His first 'Reckon-book,' in which he explained his peculiar method, appeared in 1518. It was somewhat on the principle of the calculating frame of the Chinese; a series of lines were drawn across a sheet of paper, on which, by the position of counters, numbers could be reckoned up to hundreds of thousands. The first line of the series was for units, the second for tens, the third for hundreds, the fourth for thousands, the fifth for ten thousands, and so on. It is remarkable that the highest counting-limit at that time was a thousand. The word 'million' was as yet unknown to the great body of calculators. Every number was counted, specified, and limited by thousands. The numeration of large numbers was thus expressed: the sum was divided into threes from right to left; a dot was placed over the first, and a second dot over the third of the following three, and so continued along the whole, until at last a dot stood over every fourth figure from the right. For example,

which were read, six thousand thousand thousand thousand thousand thousand times thousand, 432 thousand thousand thousand thousand thousand times thousand, 798 thousand thousand thousand thousand times thousand, 642 thousand thousand thousand times thousand, 102 thousand thousand times thousand, 791 thousand times thousand, 527 thousand and 462. With this curiosity of arithmetic we close our Jottings for the present.