Page:Notes and Queries - Series 11 - Volume 9.djvu/305

 ii s. ix. APRIL is, ion.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

301

LONDON, SATURDAY, APRIL 18,

CONTENTS. No. 225.

NOTES : The Widener-Stevenson Collection, 301 Webster and the ' N.E.D.,' 302 A Wolfe Dispatch Great Fire of London : Contemporary Letter, 304 " Plowden " ' N & Q.' in Fiction Phil May and his Biographers Allsop Place Samuel Annesley, 305 King's College Hospital" T. K." Identified, 306.

QUERIES : " Stackfreed " Bothwell, 306-John Swinfen Gale Families Shaftesbury's ' Judgment of Hercules ' Briefs Authors Wanted Biographical Information Wanted, 307 Battledore and Shuttlecock : Technical Terms Antedated Patent of Nobility " Cor vicer," an Old Trade Brian Duppa, Bishop of Winchester" An honest man and a good bowler " Wilkinson's Iron Chapel Sir Nathaniel Mead, 308 Kendrick of Beading " Burganes "An Opera Pass" Kemendyne," 309.

REPLIES : Uncollected Kipling Items, 309 Fox of Strad- broke, 310 Milo as Surname Push-Plough, 311 Leyson Family St. Pancras Bibliography History of Glass-making, 312 W. Ive ' Montalbert,' Old Novel " Rucksack '" or " Rucksack " Pallavicini : Jaszber^nyi Lieut. -Col. James MacPherson " MacFarlan's geese" Altars, 314 Jeremiah Horrocks Authors of Quota- tions Wanted Magistrates wearing Hats, 315 Rhubarb Communion Table by Grinling Gibbons Human Fat as a Medicine Barbers and Yellow' Napoleon dans 1'Autre Monde,' 316 The Taylor Sisters Law Maxim- Harwich and George I. A " Quarrel d'Olman "Parishes in Two Counties Fee- Farm Rents, 317 Sir John Dyn- ham, 318.

NOTES ON BOOKS: 'Dedications' Marlowe's 'Ed- ward II.'' The Divine Right of Kings ' ' Book-Prices Current ' " Bohn's Popular Library " ' The Antiquary.'

OBITUARY : Edward Marston. Notices to Correspondents.

JEUrfcs*

THE WIDENER-STEVENSON COLLECTION.

OF the many valuable lives that were lost in the Titanic a couple of years ago. not one showed greater promise of distinction than that of Harry Elkins Widener. Dying at the early age" of 27, he left behind him a reputation hardly second to that of the most renowned of book - collectors and biblio- graphers.

Mr. Widener belonged to a wealthy family, and the difficulties that beset the humbler class of collectors were, perhaps, hardly known to him. But it is one thing to buy books, and another thing to know them, and the extent of Mr. Widener's knowledge may be gauged from the sumptuous catalogue of the more important books and manuscripts in his collection of which he printed 102 copies in 1910 for private distribution. For

the very accurate bibliographical descriptions of the books included in this catalogue Mr. Widener was responsible. On the aims of bibliography, indeed, his views were large, for he'contended that a mere description of a book was not sufficient, but that all the circumstances attendant on its inception, its execution, and its publication should be recorded for the satisfaction of the student.

My personal acquaintance with Mr. Widener was but slight, but it was sufficient to enable me to appreciate both his lovable disposition, and the keen enthusiasm which he displayed in following his favourite pursuit. It was astonishing that at so early an age he could have acquired a know- ledge of books that would have done honour to a veteran.

Mr. Widener's taste in collecting was eclectic, and a fine Caxton and a precious manuscript of Thackeray were equally wel- come to his shelves. But from his student days at Harvard, the works of Robert Louis Stevenson had always possessed an irre- sistible attraction for him. No modern writer makes such an appeal to youth as Stevenson ; and even in the case of elderly persons, an appreciation of the author of ' Weir of Hermiston ' is always an indication of freshness of mind. From an early age, therefore, Mr. Widener had begun to collect first editions of this writer, whose works became his inseparable companions. In the course of a few years he had secured the finest collection of " Stevensons " in existence, and at the time of his lamented death in April, 1912, there were very few gaps to be filled up in this department of his library.

It was almost a necessity that a biblio- graphical catalogue should be made of this collection, and the work has been carried out in the most efficient manner by Mr. A. S. W. Rosenbach, of Philadelphia, who has produced a volume which ranks in every way amongst the choicest monuments of bibliography. In outward form it is a magnificent quarto of 266 pages, and it contains over ninety facsimiles of title- pages and manuscripts. One hundred and fifty copies have been printed at the charge of Mrs. George D. Widener as a memorial of her son.

The collection contains every printed work of Stevenson, with one or two slight exceptions, but its most attractive features are three in number. Of these the first is the trial, or proof, edition of ' Penny Whistles ' (afterwards known as ' A Child's Garden of Verses '), of which only one other copy is in existence. Nine poems are printed in this