There are, of course, ridiculous[1] people who value such books as the first issue of the first edition of Dickens’s _American Notes_ just because there is a mistake in the pagination; or a first edition of Disraeli’s _Lothair_ because the prototype of “Monsignor Catesby” is divulged by misprinting the name “Capel”; or _Poems_ by Robert Burns, first Edinburgh Edition, because in the list of subscribers “The Duke of Roxborough” appears as “The Duke of Boxborough”; or Barker’s “Breeches” Bible of 1594, because on the title-page of the New Testament the figures are transposed to 1495; or the first edition in French of Washington Irving’s _Sketch Book_, because the translator, maltreating the author’s name, has declared the book to be “traduit de l’Anglais de M. Irwin Washington,” and in the dedication has labelled Sir Walter Scott, _Barronnet_; or indeed a book of my own, in which I described as “since dead” a gifted and genial gentleman who I am glad to think still gives the lie to my inexcusable carelessness. {3} [1] I am quite aware that “ridiculous” is a dangerous stone to throw, when one lives in a glass house oneself. But it is not _because_ of such errors that a true book-lover desires to own _editiones principes_ of famous works. That ambition is legitimate enough, but its legitimate reason is otherwhere to seek. In the case of such a book as Rogers’s _Italy_, with the Turner engravings, the matter is very different. Here the fact that the plates on pp. 88 and 91 are transposed is a guarantee that the impressions of the extraordinarily delicate engravings are of the utmost brilliancy, for the error was discovered before many impressions had been taken. The same applies, though in lesser degree, to such a book as Mr. Austin Dobson’s _Ballad of Beau Brocade_, illustrated by Mr. Hugh Thomson, in the earliest edition of which certain of the illustrations are also misplaced.[2] There is reason in wishing to possess these. See what Ruskin himself has said of the omission of the two engravings which had appeared in the first edition of _The Two Paths_. He writes in the preface to the 1878 reissue: {4} [2] Compare also the early issues of the first edition of Ainsworth’s _Tower of London_, in which the plates at pp. 28 and 45 vary from those in the later issues. “I own to a very enjoyable pride in making the first editions of my books valuable to their possessors, who found out, before other people, that these writings and drawings were good for something . . . and the two lovely engravings by Messrs. Cuff and Armytage will, I hope, render the old volume more or less classical among collectors.” From this we gather that “the Professor” was of the right kidney.