The 1894 Sale of a First Edition of The Temple in New York

Abstract

In recent years, the highest reported prices fetched by a first edition of Herbert's The Temple came at the Sotheby sale (15 November 1978) of the so-called Borowitz copy of the 1633 first state edition for $13,000. A little more than six months later (14 June 1979) the so-called Houghton edition of the 1633 first state printing of The Temple went for £7,000 at Christie's. These figures, high as they are, probably fall far short of the price paid for a first edition in the autumn of 1894, if difference in buying power is considered, for during an auction reported by a New York paper following the sale of the Charles B. Foote collection by Bangs & Co., the price fetched was $1 ,050, a bid tendered by Dodd, Mead & Co. Here is the reporter's account: