A Bibliographical, Antiquarian and Picturesque Tour in France and Germany, Volume Two by Thomas Frognall Dibdin
page 51 of 355 (14%)
page 51 of 355 (14%)
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volumes. Here are all sorts and sizes of the uncial or capital-letter MSS--
in portions, or entire. Here, too, are very precious old illuminations, and specimens--almost without number--admirably arranged, of every species of BIBLIOGRAPHICAL VIRTÙ, which cannot fail to fix the attention, enlarge the knowledge, and improve the judgment, of the curious in this department of research. Such, my dear friend, is the necessarily rapid--and, I fear, consequently imperfect--sketch which I send you of the general character of the BIBLIOTHÈQUE DU ROI; both as respects its dead and its living treasures. It remains to be seen how this sketch will be completed.--- and I hereby give you notice, that my next letter will contain some account of a few of the more ancient, curious, and splendid MANUSCRIPTS--to be followed by a second letter, exclusively devoted to a similar account of the PRINTED BOOKS. If I execute this task according to my present inclinations--and with the disposition which I now feel, together with the opportunities which have been afforded me--it will not, I trust, be said that I have been an idle or unworthy visitor of this magnificent collection. [16] [Mons. Crapelet takes fire at the above passage: simply because he misunderstands it. In not one-word, or expression of it, is there any thing which implies, directly or indirectly, that "it would be difficult to find another public establishment where the officers are more active, more obliging, more anxious to satisfy the Public than in the above." I am talking only of _dress_--and commending the silk stockings of Mons. Van Praet at the expense of those by whom he is occasionally surrounded.] [17] So, even NOW: 1829. |
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