Without a distinguishing mark of some kind beyond the initials, it is hopeless to try and ascribe bindings to particular stationers, though a careful examination of the style or evidences as to early ownership may help us to determine with some accuracy the country at least from which the binding comes. Even a study of the forwarding of a binding is of great help. The method of sewing and putting on headbands is quite different in Italian books from those of other countries. Again, all small books were, as a rule, sewn on three bands in England and Normandy; in other countries the rule is for them to have four. The leather gives sometimes a clue, _e.g._ in parts of France sheepskin was used in place of calf. Cambridge bindings can often be recognised from a peculiar red colouring of the leather. So little has been done as yet to classify the different peculiarities of style or work in these early bindings, that it can hardly be expected that much should be known about them; at present the study is still in its infancy, but there is no doubt that, if persevered in, it will have valuable results. These bindings were for the most part produced, certainly in the sixteenth century, by men who were not printers, and whose names we have consequently few chances of discovering. All that can therefore be done is to classify them according to style, and according to such extraneous information as may be available. It is useless with no other information to attempt to assign initials. But while the bindings and the designs afford valuable information, the materials employed in making the bindings are also of great importance. The boards were often made of refuse printed leaves pasted together, and were always lined, after the binding was completed, with leaves of paper or vellum, printed or manuscript. On this subject I cannot do better than give the following quotation from one of Henry Bradshaw’s Memoranda, No. 5, _Notice of the Bristol fragment of the Fifteen Oes_:—