Page:Notes by the Way.djvu/331

 NOTES BY THE WAY.

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��Dunstan, where crowds constantly collected, as my father has often told me, to see the two life-size savage figures strike the hour. These were bought by Lord Hertford when the church was pulled down in 1830. He named his house in Regent's Park St. Dunstan's after the church in Fleet Street. The first Lord Aldenham bought the house in 1856. He died on the 13th of September, 1907.

The first sale of importance at the Fleet Street house was that of the library of John Mac Diarmid, author of ' The Lives of British Statesmen.' This was followed by the dispersal of many other private collections ; but the most important of all was the David Garrick Sale, the books being removed for the purpose from his villa at Hampton and his house in Adelphi Terrace. The sale began on Shakespeare's birthday, 1823, and lasted ten days. Among the lots was a copy of Hogarth's works which fetched 100. It is curious to relate that a few of the books then sold were again sold by the Hodgson firm as recently as February, 1902.

On Lady Day, 1829, Messrs. Hoare the bankers, requiring to extend their premises, bought 39, Fleet Street, and the Hodgson firm found a new home at 192, Fleet Street, at the east corner of Chancery Lane.

A few months before this, Mr. Saunders retired from the firm, and Mr. Edmund Hodgson, the grandfather of the present active partners, undertook the entire control.

The week of the Hodgson Centenary was notable for two other celebrations, although of a very different character. The proceedings in connexion with the Centenary of the Geological Society began on Thursday, September 26th, when the President, Sir Archibald Geikie, gave a discourse on ' The State of Geology at the Time of the Foundation of the Society ' ; while the preceding day, the 25th of September, was the Jubilee of the relief of Luck- now, the statue of Havelock in Trafalgar Square being decorated in honour of the occasion.

The Hodgsons are naturally full of book-auction lore, and Mr. Sidney Hodgson tells us that the first book-auction of which there is a catalogue was in 1676, when William Cooper, a book- seller, sold the library of Dr. Lazarus Seaman, Master of Peterhouse, who died in 1675. Dr. Seaman's Catalogue is entitled " Catalogus Variorum et Insiginum Librorum instructissimae Bibliothecae Clarissimi Doctissimique Viri Lazari Seaman, S. T. D. Quorum Auctio habebitur Londini hi aedibus Defuncti in Area et Viculo Warwicensi, Octobris ultimo. Cura Gulielmi Cooper, Bibliopolae. 1676. 4to, pp. 137." Dr. Seaman's residence was in Warwick Court, Warwick Lane. In the Preface to the Reader the auctioneer says :

" It hath not been usual here in. England to make Sale of Books by way of Auction, or who will give most for them; but it having been practised in other countries to the advantage both of buyers and sellers,

��Library of

John Mac

Diarmid.

Garrick's library.

��1907, Oct. 5.

Centenary of

the

Geological Society.

Jubilee of the

relief of

Lucknow.

Mr. Sidney Hodgson.

Library of

Dr. Lazarus

Seaman.

�� �