Antony Verard was accustomed to take a certain number of fine copies on vellum or paper of each book published by him, in which authorised painters added miniatures and ornaments. It is curious now to find what the cost to one of the great lords of the court of Charles VIII. was of one of these special copies in all the details of its impression, and we find it in a document published by M. Senemaud in a provincial journal (_Bulletin de la Société Archéologique de la Charente_, 1859, part 2, p. 91), which enables us at the same time to penetrate into a printing office of a great French publisher of the fifteenth century. According to this document, Verard did not disdain to put his own hand to the work, even to carrying the book to the house of his patron if he were a man of consequence. It is an account of Charles de Valois-Angoulême, father of Francis I. He was then living at Cognac; and he ordered Verard to print separately for him on vellum the romance of Tristan, the "Book of Consolation" of Boetius, the _Ordinaire du Chrétien_, and _Heures en François_, each with illuminations and binding. In the detail of expenses Verard omits nothing. He reckons the parchment at three sous four deniers the sheet, the painted and illuminated figures at one écu the large and five sols the small. We give here the outline of one of the plates of the Tristan, ordered by the Duc d'Angoulême, reduced by two-thirds, and from it it may be judged that the profession of the illuminator, even for the time, was by no means brilliant. The binding was in dark-coloured velvet, with two clasps with the arms of the Duke, which cost sixty sous each. The work finished, Verard took the route for Cognac, carrying the precious volumes. He was allowed twenty livres for carriage; and this brings the total to 207 livres 10 sous, equivalent to £200 to £240 of present money. [Illustration: Fig. 29.--Plate from the Tristan published by Antony Verard, a copy of which was illuminated for Charles of Angoulême.]