Early English books printed • before 1640 are coveted in
proportion to their literary merit, with Shakespeare leading the way. It is becoming apparent that the same rule applies to later English books. First editions of all our classic authors are rapidly rising in price, now that many collectors are specializing in them and finding them scarce. Thus, for example, the latest catalogue from Messrs. P. J. and A. E. Dobcll prices a first edition of Henry Fielding's Jonathan Wild the Great and other pieces (1743) as £35, and the forty- seven original folio sheets of Swift's anti-Whig journal, the Eawminer (1710-11) at £8 8s. Twenty or even ten years ago the minor pieces of these great authors attracted little atten- tion and could be bought for trivial sums. Defoe, again, with his innumerable productions, is now a favourite with col lectors ; his catchpenny tract on Jonathan Wild (1725) is priced at £15. The British Museum is understood to be filling the many gaps in its collection of English eighteenth-century literature. The task will be none too easy.
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