With the invention and spread of the knowledge of printing, however, the risk of loss was greatly reduced. Such ancient writings as came into the printer's hands were given a fresh lease of life which in many cases was of indefinite length, or rather, of practically eternal duration. But the fact of being printed was not invariably a safeguard. Some of the works of the early printers have disappeared completely, and many are represented only by single copies. The strange history of the British Museum copy of the famous _Book of St Albans_, will serve to show the vicissitudes with which the relics of the past have to contend in their journey down the ages.
At the end of the last century the library of an old Lincolnshire house was overhauled by someone who disdainfully turned out of it all unbound books, and had them destroyed. A few of the condemned books, however, were begged by the gardener. Among them was the Book of St Albans. At the gardener's death his son threw away some of the rescued volumes, but kept the "Book." At the son's death, his widow sold such books as he had left, to a pedlar, for the sum of ninepence. The pedlar re-sold them to a chemist in Gainsborough for shop-paper, but observing the strange wood-cuts in the "Book," the chemist offered it to a stationer for a guinea. The stationer would not purchase, but said he would display it in his window as a curiosity. Here it attracted attention, and five pounds was offered for it by a gentleman in the neighbourhood. The stationer, finding the volume an object of desire, gave the chemist two pounds for it and eventually sold it to a bookseller for seven guineas. Of this bookseller the Right Hon. Thomas Grenville bought it for seventy pounds, and bequeathed it to the British Museum with the rest of his magnificent library. This story I give on the authority of Mr Blades, who also, to instance the way in which books travel about and turn up in odd places, relates that a brother of Bishop Heber's, who had been for years seeking for a book printed by Colard Mansion, but without success, one day received a fine copy from the bishop, who had bought it from a native on the banks of the Ganges.
In literary Greece and Rome, so far as we can tell from the somewhat meagre information handed down to us, literature was pursued for her own sake, and filthy lucre did not enter into the calculations of authors, who appear to have been satisfied if their works met with the approval of those who were competent to judge of them. Literature walked alone, and had not as yet entered into partnership with commerce. The writing of books for pecuniary profit is a wholly modern development, and even now it is more often an aspiration than a realisation.