The editions of the first English books ranged at about two hundred copies: the type was what we call black letter, of which four varieties were used on the Caxton press, and the punctuation--if any--was of the crudest. An occasional sample of his work appears from time to time on the market even now; but not at prices which are inviting to the most of us. Thus in 1862, there was sold in England, a little Latin tractate printed by Caxton--of only ten leaves quarto, with twenty-four lines to the page, for £200; and I observe upon the catalogue of a recent date of Mr. Quaritch (the London bibliopole) a copy of _Godefroi de Bouloyne_, of the Caxton imprint, offered at the modest price of £1,000. Very shortly after the planting of this first press at Westminster, others were established at Oxford and also at the great monastery of St. Albans. Among the early books printed at this latter place--say within ten years after Caxton’s first--was a booklet written by a certain Dame Juliana Barnes;[66] it is the first work we have encountered written by a woman; and what do you think may have been its subject? Religion--poesy--love--embroidery? Not one of these; but some twenty odd pages of crude verse “upon the maner of huntyng for all maner of bestys” (men--not being included); and she writes with the gusto and particularity of a man proud of his falcons and his dogs. Warton says blandly: “The barbarism of the times strongly appears in the indelicate expressions which she often uses; and which are equally incompatible with her sex and profession.” The allusion to her “profession” has reference to her supposed position as prioress of a convent; this, however, is matter of grave doubt. _Old Private Letters._ But this is not the only utterance of a female voice which we hear from out those years of barrenness and moil. In 1787 there appeared in England a book made up of what were called Paston Letters[67]--published and vouched for by an antiquarian of Norfolk, who had the originals in his possession--and which were in fact familiar letters that had passed between the members and friends of a well-to-do Norfolk family in the very years of the War of the Roses, of Caxton, of King Richard, and of Wynkyn de Worde. Among the parties to these old letters, there is a John Paston senior and a Sir John Paston, and a John Paston the younger and a good Margery Paston; there is a Sir John Fastolf too--as luck would have it. Was this the prototype[68] of Shakespeare’s man of humors? Probably not: nor can we say of a certainty that he was the runaway warrior who was of so bad repute for a time in the army of the Duke of Bedford: but we do know from these musty papers that he had a “Jacket of red velvet, bound round the bottom with red leather,” and “Another jacket of russet velvet lyned with blanket clothe;” also “Two jackets of deer’s leather, with a collar of black velvet,” and so on.