The plant and material of the once famous printing-office was sold at auction, in 1713, for the benefit of the creditors and of a daughter left by Abraham. For nearly a century the printing of the University had been in the hands of the Elzevir family, but after the migration in 1665, of Louis to Amsterdam, the more important of the publishing undertakings of the Elzevirs bear the imprint of the Amsterdam House. The first printer to the University had been William Silvius, who had, before coming to Leyden, held in Antwerp the title of Printer to the King. Silvius was a scholar as well as a printer, and having given evidence of sympathy with the Protestant group, he found it desirable to get away from Antwerp. He held the post in Leyden for but a few months, dying in 1580. For nearly four years, the University appears to have dispensed with the services of a University printer and publisher, but in 1584, the position was given to Christophe Plantin, the famous Antwerp publisher, who was at the time, in connection with certain difficulties, an exile from his home city. It is probable from his acceptance of the post and from the labour given by him to the organisation of an effective printing establishment, that Plantin had seriously in view at the time the plan of a permanent transfer to Leyden of his business interests. In 1585, however, his difficulties having been adjusted, Plantin found it practicable to return to Antwerp, but he was able, in leaving Leyden, to secure from the University authorities the appointment as his successor of his son-in-law Raphelengius. The latter added to his duties as a printer the professorship of Hebrew in the University, and it is evident from the record that he was more assiduous in his work as an instructor than in attention to the rather complex responsibilities of the University printing-office. On the death of Raphelengius, in 1597, the post was given to his son Christopher, who survived his father, however, but for four years. The successor of the younger Raphelengius was a certain Johannes Patius (Jean Paedts). His work appears to have been unsatisfactory, and, in 1620, Isaac Elzevir, grandson of Louis, came into direction of the University printing. The annual compensation given to Silvius and, later, to Plantin, was two hundred florins. Under the agreement with Isaac Elzevir, the money payment was fixed at fifty florins. It seems probable, however, that during the thirty-five years that had passed since the first establishment of the office, there had been a sufficient development in the incidental business connected with the University printing and publishing to render the post more valuable in 1620 with a stipend of fifty florins, than it had been in 1585 with a payment of two hundred.