Jean Grolier is the representative collector of the early French school, but he was, at the same time, the most famous judge of bindings that the world has yet seen. He was born at Lyons in 1479, and died in 1565, having spent nearly the whole of his life in the collection of books. His opinion of French binders appears to have been the reverse of complimentary, for he went to Italy to find a workman after his own heart, and one who could be relied upon to satisfy his fastidious taste. Many people think that Grolier was by trade a bookbinder, but this is a mistake--he was merely an enthusiastic amateur who allowed his passion for bindings to become his master. Some of his designs he prepared himself; others are undoubted imitations of those adopted by Maioli, whom he so greatly admired, that even his motto is reproduced, with of course the necessary variation, "Io Grolierii et Amicorum". This appears on the sides of most of his books, and there is consequently no difficulty in identifying them. Others bear an emblem, and in a scroll, "AEque difficulter," and others again the words of the Psalmist arranged so as to form a triangle, "Portio mea Domine sit in terra viventium".[12] Most of Grolier's books were printed by Aldus at Venice, and they are generally found lettered on the back, a practice which was not in vogue before his day. But however bound, and whatever device, maxim, or motto he employed, the name of Grolier invariably causes great excitement among amateurs. The value of any of his books is proverbial, and their scarcity equally so. A rare book may occasionally be snapped up for a hundredth part of its worth, not so a magnificent specimen of binding, which courts further inquiries on the part of the vendor, and, as we all know, "further inquiries" are usually fatal to the would-be snapper-up of unconsidered valuables. Louis de Sainte-Maure was a contemporary of Grolier, and like him an enthusiastic book hunter. His bindings are said to be even rarer still. They too are tooled with geometrical figures, and on the side, in the centre, is the inscription, "Invia virtuti nulla est via".