includes the identical edition of each book said by the Sotheby catalogue for the Leeds Sale of 1930 to bear the signature of Congreve.

But the most convincing proof that the list could have belonged only to Congreve is provided by three quarto volumes, each with Congreve’s signature on the title page, bound together as one volume. This volume, as described by the Sotheby catalogue for the Leeds Sale, was made up of (1) Dryden’s Of Dramatick Poesie, 1684; (2) Horace’s Art of Poetry, made English by the Earl of Roscommon, 1684; and (3) The Rehearsal, 1687. In other words, the three separate quartos had been specially bound together to form a unique volume, one to be found only in Congreve’s library. This same unique volume appears as item Number 406 in the manuscript list, where it is described as one of the “Miscellanies bound together,” consisting of “Dryden’s Essay on Dram. Poetry, Horace’s Art of Poetry by ye E. of Roscommon, and the Rehearsal”—the identical three quartos described in the Sotheby catalogue.

In June, 1930, while the “Selected” books from the Leeds library were being sold at Sotheby’s in London in a three-day sale (referred to hereafter as the Leeds Sale), the “remaining contents” of Hornby Castle were auctioned off by Knight, Frank, and Rutley at old Hornby Castle in Yorkshire in a seven-day sale (referred to hereafter as the Hornby Castle Sale). The books, which made only a minor part of the latter sale, were all auctioned off on the sixth day. These books were catalogued as Lots 1097 through 1294, with from 2 to 430 books in a single lot, making a total of about 7,475. Only a very small fraction of these were mentioned by title in the printed catalogue, and nothing was said about signatures on title pages. But among those mentioned appear twenty-one of the exact editions in Congreve’s list: Numbers 37, 71, 158, 161, 168, 172, 233, 270, 288, 343, 380, 467, 492, 493, 499, 500, 516, 533, 543, 620, 652. Among the “Selected” books catalogued for the Leeds Sale appear sixty-one of the exact editions in Congreve’s list: Numbers 4, 10, 42, 55, 76, 79 (or 80), 96, 97, 98, 152, 160, 178, 179, 182, 183, 184, 207, 208, 234, 257, 258, 262, 281, 283, 292, 342, 360, 367, 406, 413, 421, 423, 427, 441, 442, 444, 451, 455, 458, 460, 462, 463, 465, 502, 507, 518, 529, 534, 536, 542, 544, 553, 558, 566, 579, 592, 639, 641, 649, 651, 656.

Since Congreve’s books had been incorporated with the Leeds library in 1740, we can understand how eighty-two of the identical editions in the list could turn up in sales of Leeds books in 1930. Most of the eighty-two exact editions named (and many of the thousands of unnamed books) in these sales were probably once Congreve’s. The fact that Sotheby’s catalogue mentions the Congreve signature in only ten books suggests that he usually failed to write his name in his books. Sotheby lists most of the books for which Congreve is known to have subscribed, and yet no mention is made of a Congreve signature in any of them. Nor does any signature appear in the special edition of Rowe’s Shakespeare (Number 544 in the list) now in the Folger Shakespeare Library and almost certainly once Congreve’s.

But other books besides the ten mentioned by Sotheby’s were signed by Congreve. One example is Sotheby’s item Number 532 (Congreve’s Number 518), which was sold to McLeish and Sons and then to E. S. de Beer, Esq., before the unmistakable signature of the dramatist was noted. Another example is Congreve’s Number 501, which was in the Hornby Castle Sale and bears the true signature, “Wm: Congreve.” Especially significant is a letter to the editor dated August 20, 1949, from Her Grace Katherine, Duchess of the tenth Duke of Leeds, stating that many years ago she had herself “made a great hunt for any books at Hornby Castle bearing the signature of Congreve,” had