The Marietta journal. [volume] (Marietta, Ga.) 1866-1909, 1897-03-04
BOCKSELLlNG, OLD AND NEW
A Change That Is Marked and Likely "a
BE Permanent

i
Be Permanent.
The lamentations of old time EngS
lish bookseller have been utteSeG
with frequency and not with
pathos in recent years The chs
chat has come over his trade Il
marked as 1T seems likely to be
manent. Beginning among W
may be called the more mo-
grades of the trade-the sIz
dealers in secondhand books H.
extended upward to the fina
but in degree has had eff
bly, less as the scale risd
smaller towns the chang
even more marked than i
Not only has the subject rise
dignity of treatment in one i
great monthly magazines Of
don, but The Academy has pl
reports about it from provincial
tiers. The story scarcely VAR i
its general tone, wherever it q 4
from. Everywhere has the SCI
hand trade been bad-in Shed
in Dundee, in Leeds, in Dublin
In our own land much the N j
conditions prevail, and from sim
causes. A tour of Nassau street
not now disclose the same shopsA
once were so numerous. BookSh1
are there. But if they are NOT J.
numerous, the character of u
trade has changed. The chand
finding rare volume on the
walk stall have become extrd
few in that neighborhood.
This has naturally resulted from
the increase in collecting and il
knowledge of books. More and moro
have the up town shops and the
auction rooms become the places
where collectors go to find rare and
first editions. Before it had become
a large pursuit to hunt for these
books they were rarely to be found
up town, save at the small second
hand dealers those dark base
ments. of theirs and those Canal
street and avenue shops that were
once so frequent. Now they may be
had in the best stores, where are
found thriving departments devoted
to these books and whence are is
sued special catalogues of them.
And with this change has come
another in the selling of books that
is new. No more remarkable inhu-
ence has entered the trade than the
influence of the dry goods stores,
where departments devoted to the
sale of the days popular books have
grown to large proportions. But it
does not follow that the regular
bookstores in their totals of trade
have really suffered. What they
may have lost in one direction they
have probably made up in Athers-
for one thing in what are known as
collectors books, for another in fine
editions, in well bound books, and
again in limitededitions. Moreover,
it is necessary to remember that the
number of persons who buy books
has enormously increased. The total
of books published and the total of
sales for each successful book pre-.
sent striking contrasts to the CORE
spending totals for 10 and 20 years
ago. The sales which Du Maurier
and Maclaren, Hall Caine and Kip
ling, Stevenson and Mrs. Ward have
had would have astonished the trade
and set all the world to writing
novels-as has now, unfortunately,
been done.
The larger view of this change
will scarcely awaken regrets. Even
houses which have suffered from it
have probably seen way to other
profits and other methods which
have brought their compensations.
Meanwhile the public has bought
more books than ever before, has
read more, and the general level of
knowledge and culture has CORE
spondingly been raised. And this
increase will continue Men more
and moro are acquiring the laudable
habit of buying book as willingly
as they buy handful of cigars, and
women one as willingly as they buy
a pair of gloves. New York Times.