same tome in morocco, stamped with Longepierre's fleece of gold. But these things are indifferent to bookbinders, new and old. There lies on the table, as I write, "Les Provinciales, ou Les Lettres Ecrites par Louis de Montalte à un Provincial de ses amis, & aux R.R. P.P. Jesuites. A Cologne, Ches Peirre de la Valleé, M.DC.LVIII." It is the Elzevir edition, or what passes for such; but the binder has cut down the margin so that the words "Les Provinciales" almost touch the top of the page. Often the wretch—he lived, judging by his style, in Derome's time, before the Revolution—has sliced into the head-titles of the pages. Thus the book, with its old red morocco cover and gilded flowers on the back, is no proper companion for "Les Pensees de M. Pascal (Wolfganck, 1672)," which some sober Dutchman has left with a fair allowance of margin, an inch "taller" in its vellum coat than its neighbour in morocco. Here once more, is "Les Fascheux, Comedie de I. B. P. Molière, Representee sur Le Theatre du Palais Royal. A Paris, Chez Gabriel Quinet, au Palais, dans la Galerie des Prisonniers, à l'Ange Gabriel, M.DCLXIII. Avec privilege du Roy." What a crowd of pleasant memories the bibliophile, and he only, finds in these dry words of the title. Quinet, the bookseller, lived "au Palais," in that pretty old arcade where Corneille cast the scene
