``Even I, sir,'' he went on, ``though far inferior in industry and discernment and presence of mind, to that great man, can show you a few--a very few things, which I have collected, not by force of money, as any wealthy man might,--although, as my friend Lucian says, he might chance to throw away his coin only to illustrate his ignorance,--but gained in a manner that shows I know something of the matter.See this bundle of ballads, not one of them later than 1700, and some of them an hundred years older.I wheedled an old woman out of these, who loved them better than her psalm-book.Tobacco, sir, snuff, and the Complete Syren, were the equivalent! For that, mutilated copy of the Complaynt of Scotland, I sat out the drinking of two dozen bottles of strong ale with the late learned proprietor, who, in gratitude, bequeathed it to me by his last will.These little Elzevirs are the memoranda and trophies of many a walk by night and morning through the Cowgate, the Canongate, the Bow, St.Mary's Wynd,--wherever, in fine, there were to be found brokers and trokers, those miscellaneous dealers in things rare and curious.How often have I stood haggling on a halfpenny, lest, by a too ready acquiescence in the dealer's first price, he should be led to suspect the value Iset upon the article!--how have I trembled, lest some passing stranger should chop in between me and the prize, and regarded each poor student of divinity that stopped to turn over the books at the stall, as a rival amateur, or prowling bookseller in disguise!--And then, Mr.Lovel, the sly satisfaction with which one pays the consideration, and pockets the article, affecting a cold indifference, while the hand is trembling with pleasure!--Then to dazzle the eyes of our wealthier and emulous rivals by showing them such a treasure as this'' (displaying a little black smoked book about the size of a primer); ``to enjoy their surprise and envy, shrouding meanwhile, under a veil of mysterious consciousness, our own superior knowledge and dexterity these, my young friend, these are the white moments of life, that repay the toil, and pains, and sedulous attention, which our profession, above all others, so peculiarly demands!''
Lovel was not a little amused at hearing the old gentleman run on in this manner, and, however incapable of entering into the full merits of what he beheld, he admired, as much as could have been expected, the various treasures which Oldbuck exhibited.Here were editions esteemed as being the first, and there stood those scarcely less regarded as being the last and best; here was a book valued because it had the author's final improvements, and there another which (strange to tell!) was in request because it had them not.One was precious because it was a folio, another because it was a duodecimo; some because they were tall, some because they were short; the merit of this lay in the title-page--of that in the arrangement of the letters in the word Finis.There was, it seemed, no peculiar distinction, however trifling or minute, which might not give value to a volume, providing the indispensable quality of scarcity, or rare occurrence, was attached to it.
