Upon Grolier's death his property was divided among his daughters' families. Some of the books were certainly sold; but the greater part of the library became the property of Meric de Vic, the old Treasurer's son-in-law. Meric was keeper of the seals to Louis XIII. His son Dominique became Archbishop of Auch. They were both fond of books, and took great care of Grolier's three thousand exquisite volumes, of which they were successively the owners. They lived in a large house in the Rue St. Martin, which had been built by Budaeus, and here the books were kept until the great dispersion in the year 1676. 'They looked,' said Bonaventure d'Argonne, 'as if the Muses had taken the outsides into their charge, as well as the contents, they were adorned with such art and _esprit_, and looked so gay, with a delicate gilding quite unknown to the book-binders of our time.' The same visitor described the sale of 1676. All Paris was to be seen at the Hotel de Vic. 'Such a glorious collection ought all to have been kept together; but, as it was, everybody got some share of the spoil.' He bought some of the best specimens himself; and as he was only a poor monk of the Chartreuse the prices can hardly have run high. M. Le Roux de Lincy has traced the fate of the volumes dispersed at the sale. We hear, he says, of examples belonging to De Mesmes and Bigot, to Colbert and Lamoignon, Captain du Fay, the Count d'Hoym, and the Prince de Soubise. Some of the finest were purchased by Baron Hohendorf and were transferred about the year 1720 to the Imperial Library at Vienna. Yet they never rose to any high price until the Soubise sale towards the end of the last century, when the weight of the English competition for books began to be felt upon the Continent. M. de Lincy has traced the adventures of more than three hundred volumes, once in Grolier's ownership, but now for the most part in public libraries. The earlier possessors are classified according to the dates of their purchases. Of those who obtained specimens soon after the old Treasurer's death we may notice especially Paul Petau the antiquarian, De Thou the historian, and Pithou the statesman and jurist. Perhaps we should add Jean Ballesdens, a collector of fine books and MSS., whose library at his death in 1677 contained nine of Grolier's books, and Pierre Seguier, to whom Ballesdens acted as secretary; and as Seguier was the personal friend of Grolier, he may have been the original recipient of some of the volumes in question.