Collector

“ It cannot be denied that, from a practical everyday stand-point, the collector who buys to sell has everything in his favour. Why should he not employ his knowledge to advantage? why be compelled to stock his library at a loss which will fall chiefly on his immediate descendants? ”

“ Our Collector is a great symbol of authority in countless villages through which he drives or rides leisurely, smoking his eternal cheroot, halting to dispense justice with unrivalled sagacity and kindliness. ”

“ There is a set of collectors, alas! whose inclinations are not virtuous. The most famous of them, a Frenchman, observed that his own collection of bad books was unique. That of an English rival, he admitted, was respectable,—"mais milord se livre a des autres preoccupations!" He thought a collector's whole heart should be with his treasures. ”

“ I know a gentleman in London who is so expert in detecting forgeries that he goes on a scent like a setter after a bird. But the real safeguard for the collector is to buy his books, not from the transient individual who has two or three bargains to offer, but from the man who is known first of all for his reputable dealing. Then collecting is sheer delight. ”

“ Often the value of a collection drops so persistently in the estimate of its possessor that he begins to contemplate exchanging it for something more up to date or interesting. But let a rival collector march forth with igniting enthusiasm and proclaim a desire for the scorned objects, and that very moment does the possessor tighten his grip on them and add a decimal or two to their value. ”

“ And if a collector, seeing them, tries to collect the revenue, the gentry take the peasant’s part and send the collector away more dead than alive, and the government officers look on, and dare not interfere. ”

“ Many collectors have become such through an increasing interest in old furniture, rare china, early silver, and other classes of antiques and curios, inspired in the beginning by the acquisition of some object of the sort, personal contact with which has served as an example of the pleasure which collecting holds in store for one. The true collector is not merely “a gatherer of things,” indifferent to the guidance of a discriminating taste. ”

“ The historian may forgive the one who has wandered from the fold, but the wanderer must in future remain within the pale. Yet how shall the collector of experiences be diverted from his diversion of collecting? The collector of old mahogany depletes his bank account and turns his modest dwelling into a veritable second-hand shop, but still his pony chaise is tied before every farmhouse that has advertised an auction sale of household effects. The lawyer whose country estate produces green peas that yearly cost him five dollars a peck, cheerfully proclaims that it pays to be a gentleman farmer. ”

“ He might be poor, but at any rate he was honest. "No, he had never been in prison."
"Then what are you?" asked the collector, in a tone not entirely free from traces of annoyance. "Surely you must be something!"
"I am more than something!" returned the visitor, proudly. "I am unique—I am a curiosity."
"What may you be?"
"I am a boy, educated by the School Board, who is satisfied to follow in the footsteps of his father. My father was a bricklayer, and I am satisfied to lay bricks myself."
"My dear Sir," said the collector, grasping him cordially by the hand, "I congratulate you. ”

“ Your true collector may often maintain reticence in order that he may enjoy a normal place in the community, undisturbed by the merely idle curious, the undeft rummaging of the clumsy, the curt depreciation of the supercilious, the gushing of the undiscriminating susceptible, or the skepticism of those who measure the sanity of their fellows by the canons of their own irrevocable and undeviating limitations, those to whom no music but the echoes of caverns can appeal. ”

“ If it were not for collectors England would be full, so to speak, of rare birds and wonderful butterflies, strange flowers and a thousand interesting things. But happily the collector prevents all that, either killing with his own hands or, by buying extravagantly, procuring people of the lower classes to kill such eccentricities as appear. It makes work for people, even though Acts of Parliament interfere. ”

“ And be it further enacted, That a collector shall be authorized to enter, at any time between the rising and setting of the sun, any building or place where any vessel, machine, implement, or utensil as aforesaid, is kept within his collection district, for the purpose of examining, measuring, or describing the same, or of inspecting the accounts of the goods, wares, and merchandise, from time to time manufactured or made. ”

“ Of course there are many other tricks resorted to by the unscrupulous, but the real collector, generally speaking, happily possesses that instinct which enables{60} him to learn his lessons quickly and inexpensively; and there are plenty of reputable antique shops wherein genuine things are to be found. ”

“ We have left dangling from the first paragraph the morally important question, Is collecting merely an habitual contravention of the tenth commandment? Now, I am far from denying that collecting has its pathology, even its criminology, if you will. The mere lust of acquisition may take the ugly form of coveting what one neither loves nor understands. This pit is digged for the rich collector. ”

“ Let not the collector ever, unless in some urgent and necessary circumstances, part with any of his treasures. Let him not even have recourse to that practice called barter, which political philosophers tell us is the universal resource of mankind preparatory to the invention of money. Let him confine all his transactions in the market to purchasing only. No good comes of gentlemen-amateurs buying and selling. ”

“ The collector who is totally uninformed respecting the history of his possessions, or whose sole satisfaction is in acquiring, ranks indeed but little higher, intellectually, than the cabinet in which his treasure is secured. ”

“ The most experienced collectors, whether general or specialist, almost invariably advise the beginner to start as a general collector. As a beginner he will have no experience to guide him in the choice of a particular group or division ”

“ But on the general ethics of collecting the compiler may be allowed the consolation of bearing his trivial testimony. The private collector who buys what he likes to read merits such reward as wise buying may earn for him. He, however, who buys by rote, puts away and resells, 3is no collector at all, but rather a trespasser on the preserves of the bookseller, taking advantage of a noble trade while sharing none of its burdens. ”

“ The collector, as a rule, sets out in the beginning with little knowledge and with no very definite notion of what he intends to collect. If he is to profit by his efforts or is to end by having an interesting group of possessions, he must before long define for himself the idea of a collection and the conception which his own is to express. He may decide to obtain at least one representative example of the work of every important artist ”

“ Apart from their pleasant sociability, these societies are of immense help to the collector, especially to the beginner. At each meeting papers are read and discussed, in which the most experienced collectors retail, for the benefit of the less experienced, the result of their latest researches, and eminent specialists display their splendid and carefully-arranged collections for the inspection, edification, and enjoyment of their fellow-members. ”

“ He keeps the dealer and collector apart, and subject to his will one or the other emerges. The feat is too difficult for average humanity. In nearly every case a prolonged struggle will end in favour of the commercial self. I have followed the course of many collector-dealers, and I know very few instances in which the collection has not averaged down to the level of a shop—a fine shop, perhaps, but still a shop. I blame no man for following the wide road, but I feel more kinship with him who walks scrupulously in the narrow path of strict amateurism. ”

“ To this last category, with a few slight modifications, belongs the type of collector who might be called ultra-141modern to distinguish him from his modern confrères of yesterday, a type that can lay no claim whatever to the definition “La collection c’est l’homme,” because he never troubles himself to hunt for works of art or curios, never experiences the joys of discovery, experiences nothing perhaps, but being cheated by dealers, friends and experts. The ultra-modern collector is, of course, amply supplied with money, and relies chiefly on his cheque-book. ”

“ Jared P. Kilgallen, J.D. and R.P.
(A Second-Cousin of Professor Kilgallen)
The lure of the antique! Who is there that has not thrilled and flushed at the words?
I confess at the outset: I am a collector and you may even call me by that damning word “dealer,” too, if you choose, since, like all non-amateur collectors, I part with items of my collection from time to time; or, if you prefer to put it so, from day to day. No collection is a permanency until it is established in an endowed museum: all private collections are constantly in a state of fluctuation, or [64] flux ”

“ The professional collector, the man who trades in specimens, is constantly blamed for the damage he does, for his looting is wholesale, but he would very soon turn his attention to some other method of gaining a living were he not patronised; it is the hoarding private collector, the man who pretends to be, but so seldom is, scientific, who is really responsible. ”

“ A nucleus is soon formed, and, that accomplished, the collector is in the toils of his hobby, and unless he is an utter failure, one of those hopeless and helpless folk who can never learn to discriminate between the true and the false, he speedily acquires a collection which has not only provided him with a delightful recreation but is a source of considerable pride. ”

“ Frederick Roe, whose volume on "Ancient Coffers and Cupboards" displays a profound knowledge of his subject, writes, "it occasionally happens that pieces are so artfully made up that only living with them will enable the collector to detect the truth. In dealing with pieces of this suspicious kind one often has to fall back on a sort of instinct. With critical collectors of every sort this innate sense plays a very important part." ”

“ It is in nowise a bibliography. I have made more additions to the "Range Life" chapter than to any other. I am a collector of such books. A collector is a person who gathers unto himself the worthless as well as the worthy. Since I did not make a nickel out of the original printing of the Guide and hardly expect to make enough to buy a California "ranch" out of the present printing, I have added several items, with accompanying remarks, more for my own pleasure than for benefit to society. ”

“ The collector has a right to ask himself these seemingly irreverent questions. Nor will he love Art less, or have an eye less delicate, because he is obliged to ask them. I do not know that the possessions of a [Pg 168] prudent collector should—taking things all round—bring him, if he desires to sell, much less than he gave for them. It may be quite enough that as long as he keeps and enjoys them, he shall lose the interest of his money. If, in the interval, the value of his prints happens to increase, so much the better for him—obviously. ”

“ The man who carries more than one-third of his business on his books is a business failure. Old accounts breed knockers. Go thou to the lawyer and consider his ways—then cinch the money.
Never employ a collector on commission. Your office girl will prove the best collector if you have not time to attend to it yourself. In fact, for general collecting, she will prove the best collector you can get. Give her an honorium in addition to her salary if she makes good. At many places the collector will be informed that the party she is seeking is not at home, or is not in the office. ”

“ Collectors and collections—Various kinds—Meaning of the word curieux—Various types of collectors: the artist, the scholar, the eclectic and the specialist—A large class of collectors as defined by La Bruyère—The ultra-modern collector—The art and curio market—The three stages of the collector’s career—The collector’s touch—The elasticity of prices and an opinion of C. T. Yerkes—Gersaint’s advice and Schlegel’s opinion—A Latin saying re-edited by Edmond Bonnaffé.
“La collection c’est l’homme,” a well-known French lover of art and first-rate connoisseur used to say. ”

“ If he must be a collector, let him be first a collector of the many excellent books now published on old furniture, china, rugs, pewter, silver, prints, the things that will come his way. You can't begin collecting one thing without developing an enthusiasm for the contemporary things. ”

“ The successful collector must, first of all, be a good judge of character; [149] he must be able to read character, and govern himself by what he learns of his customer's peculiarities. He must be a diplomat, with the happy faculty of smoothing out the rough spots, and satisfying the chronic kicker. ”

“ The work of the collector is indispensable; but it is only a small part of the work that ought to be done; and after collecting has reached a certain point the work of the field observer with the gift for recording what he has seen becomes of far more importance. ”

“ As I think that, speaking generally, the wisest collector is the collector who devotes himself to original work, we will begin the study of some various departments of the collector’s pursuit by a group of chapters on work that is wholly original. ”