BOOK-PRICES CURRENT, VOLUMES I. TO XIV. Being a Record of the Prices at which Books have been sold at Auction during the years 1887 to 1900, with the Titles and Descriptions of the Books in full, the Catalogue Numbers, and the Names of the Purchasers. Some of the earlier volumes are out of print and others are at a premium. Reports will be made by the publisher in answer to queries. Opinions of the Press. "Book-Prices Current '-the Whitaker's Almanack of book-buyers and booksellers."-Illustrated London News. "A very useful and admirably edited and printed publication."-Morning Post. "To praise Book-Prices Current' is unnecessary; it has become indispensable to book collectors, and of vital interest to all who care for literature."-Globe. "Brunet, indeed, so long the book-buyer's chief delight, must yield to 'Book-Prices Current." "-Notes and Queries. Its own "It is beyond comparison the book-collector's cyclopædia. earlier volumes, curiously enough, command very high prices."—Daily Chronicle. "The practical utility to buyers and sellers of an authoritative annual work of reference like this requires no demonstration. The knowledge and skill displayed in this compilation merit cordial recognition." Standard. "To all classes of bookmen, the issues of 'Book-Prices Current' may be fairly pronounced indispensable."-Literary World. "It may be said without exaggeration that the annual volumes of Mr. Slater's admirable compilation are indispensable to such as desire to follow with any closeness the record of sales and the movements of the secondhand book market."-Times. This "Valuable to booksellers, and still more so to book-buyers. useful work has long established its position, and must have saved many a collector a bad bargain."-Athenæum. "The work supplies a finely printed record which will be valued, not by the bookseller merely, but by the collector and librarian."—Daily Telegraph. "The book collector's Bible."-Pall Mall Gazette. "The record is extremely useful for buyers and collectors of books, and is a valuable index to current phases of book-collecting, and to fluctuations in the market."-Saturday Review. LONDON: ELLIOT STOCK, 62, PATERNOSTER ROW, E.C. CONSTITUTING A REFERENCE LIST OF SUBJECTS KEY TO ANONYMOUS AND PSEUDONYMOUS LITERATURE LONDON: ELLIOT STOCK, 62, PATERNOSTER ROW, E.C. 1901. 85779A-GEN, INTRODUCTION HE growing series of BOOK-PRICES CURRENT long since ceeding volume seemed to accentuate the want, and sharing the need in common with others, I undertook, many months ago, a task which proved at once both onerous and responsible. The compilation was taken in hand largely as a labour of love. Under the stress of error, infinite detail, and pressure on my time, the "love" may have clouded now and then, but no diminution ever took place in the "labour." To marshal into order a manuscript involving thirty-three thousand distinct titles and considerably over half-a-million numerals is a work which calls for more than ordinary skill, patience, and vigilance, so that if errors have escaped, I can only plead ordinary powers. The ten annual indexes have been amalgamated, checked, enlarged, revised, and corrected, until the 50 pages which usually suffice for a volume have now grown to 500 pages, notwithstanding deletion of the duplicate titles. To aid easy reference, a clear-cut brevier occupies the place of the old ruby type. Few things compel more respect for labour than hard work. Hence the esteem in which, with most bookmen, I held the herculean efforts of those pioneer bibliographersBrunet, Watt, Lowndes, Bohn, and Allibone-has given way, in my case, to admiration unbounded. Forging so huge a key to the treasures of BooK-PRICES CURRENT was arduous and exacting in the extreme, but some compensation lay in the knowledge that it might fill to some extent the vacuum caused by the want of an up-to-date Lowndes." 66 |