more often chosen. The latter, the so-styled cradle period of the art,
is wanting in real definition, being at most a convenient halting place,
not a completed stage, whereas at the middle of the sixteenth century
the printed book of the better class had acquired most of its maturer
features and no longer has for us an unfamiliar look. Designed to serve
as a permanent exhibition, it is a selection rather than a collection,
not large, but wisely chosen, and no less attractive than instructive,
having been formed a quarter of a century ago, at a time when
opportunities were unusually favorable.

The surviving books of the first presses, which are the chief sources of
our knowledge of the early art, are at the same time, when obtainable,
the most efficient teachers. For the illustration of the typography, the
feature of first importance, there is nothing comparable to the open
pages of a representative series of the original books, such as are here
spread out before us. The best of the available substitutes, phototype
reproductions of specimen pages, apart from other limitations, must
always lack the authority and the impressiveness of the originals.

While it is the main office of the present collection to set before the
students of the University as a whole the more general features of the
art of the early printer, a further service which it is prepared to
render must not be overlooked. To such as are prompted to go into the
subject more deeply it offers an excellent body of the original
material upon which any serious study must of necessity be based.

The two fine fifteenth century MSS. at the head of the collection, far
from serving a merely ornamental purpose, like their own illuminated
initials for example, are a needful introduction. It is obvious that
from such sources the first printers got the models of their types, and