The Leeper Library and the Book Collections At Trinity College, The University of Melbourne by Gillian Forwood
Trinity Papers Number 9
Trinity College
The University Of Melbourne Mrs Gillian Forwood prepared this paper as Leeper Librarian at Trinity College, The University of Melbourne. Tracing the history of the Leeper Library from its foundation as the oldest of Melbourne University’s collegiate libraries, it brings together her wealth of
knowledge on the Trinity collection, placing it within the context of the broader history of Victoria and of the University of Melbourne. Aspects of this study have been reproduced elsewhere in an article for the Bulletin of the Bibliographical Society of Australia and New Zealand.
This paper represents the ninth in a series prepared by Trinity College which focus upon broad issues facing the community in such areas as education, ethics, history, politics, and science. Copies are available upon request from the Tutorial Office, Trinity College, Parkville, Victoria 3052 Australia.
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The Leeper Library and the Book Collections at Trinity College, University of Melbourne The Leeper Library reflects the early cultural traditions of Trinity College, the first residential college to be affiliated with the University of Melbourne. Trinity opened its doors to students in 1872. The library, being privately founded, remains relatively little-known in the wider university and metropolitan communities of Victoria, yet its collections provide an unexplored bibliographic key to the cultural history of late nineteenth-century Melbourne. Born during an era when public libraries were first being established in Australia, Trinity's library provides the means to examine a collection on a much smaller scale than that of the State Library of Victoria, opened in 1853, or the University of Melbourne Library, given its own building in 1875, but one whose unique holdings nevertheless add to the national estate. 1 It contains works which can throw light upon the world view of many of the Anglican and Anglo-Irish academics in late nineteenth and early twentieth century Australia. Adding depth to the theological collections at Trinity is the A.F. Mollison library, the Diocesan library which came to Trinity from St Paul's Cathedral in 1967. Trinity library's bookshelves contain collections bearing witness to the generosity of many donors, both its Anglican founders and other, often idiosyncratic, collectors. The library's most significant research holdings lie in Australiana in its Rusden and Atkinson collections, while its general collection celebrates the development and character of Trinity College itself. Until recently a catalogue of its early titles had not been published. The capturing of the library's pre-1801 imprints on the national database in 1994, the re-discovery of many treasures at the time the library was re-located to a new building in 1996, and the celebration of the 125th anniversary of the College in 1997 suggest it is time to look afresh at one of the oldest College libraries in Australia.2 This essay explores the attitudes of the library's founders and suggests how the library was later modified and extended until it achieved its present identity at the end of the twentieth century. A mere Antipodean fledging compared to its great namesakes, at Trinity College Dublin, founded 15923 and Trinity College Cambridge, whose library building was built by Christopher Wren in 1695, the Leeper library's development spans three eras. The first era covered the golden age of the first Warden, Dr Alexander Leeper, an era favoured by rare and curious gifts; the second period of marking time stretched across the middle years of this century; and the third period witnessed the library's coming-of-age with the consolidation of major collections and its own spacious reading room in 1996. Although Trinity College was not opened to students until 1872, the College library began with a gift of fifty pounds to buy books long before the walls were built to house the collection. The gift was made to Bishop Charles Perry, first Anglican Bishop of Melbourne, early in his episcopate by 1
Dr Leeper wrote in the preface to the first hand-written catalogue of the Leeper Library in 1884: ‘The total number of volumes in the College Library (including the Rusden collection) at the present time is five thousand three hundred and sixty seven’. Recently the holdings of the Leeper and Mollison Diocesan Library were estimated to be approximately 50,000 volumes. 2 I wish to thank Dr Damian Powell, Director of Academic Studies at Trinity College, for his encouragement in the recording of the history of the collections and Dr Evan Burge, Fifth Warden, for his support. 3 The library of Trinity College Dublin came into being shortly after the foundation of the College itself in 1592. The famous Long Room of the Old Library was designed by Thomas Burgh between 1713-1732, the prototype probably being the Wren Library of Trinity College Cambridge. See Peter Fox, ed. Treasures of the Library: Trinity College Dublin (Dublin: Trinity College, 1986), p.16. 2
his brother-in-law, the Reverend John Cooper.4 The books were housed initially in the Public Library until they could be moved to the ‘Provost's Lodge’ 5 in 1872. Bishop Perry later presented classical, historical and biographical works from his own collection to Trinity when he left the colony in February 1874. The task of forging a library from this early collection was relished by the first Warden, Alexander Leeper, who took up his position in 1876. According to Sir Keith Hancock, Leeper, an Irishman of staunchly Protestant convictions, is said to have brought with him to Trinity a number of passions: the Church, the Classics, the Act of Union, and the British Empire. 6 To this list should be added libraries. While an undergraduate at Oxford, he had involved himself in the management of the Library Committee of the Union, and shared in cataloguing classical works in the Bodleian Library. 7 Before being appointed to Trinity, Leeper had, as a member of the staff of Melbourne Grammar School, founded the school library and served as its first librarian.8 A proposal to build a College library, together with a chapel, dining hall and more accommodation to support the newly-created Trinity Theological School, had been made by Bishop James Moorhouse in 1878. Funds had not been sufficient for these developments but Leeper had embraced the idea that the academic pre-eminence of a university college depended on the quality of its library, and conscious of limited local resources, he sought gifts of books on a wide front. His efforts augmented the 1100 volumes already in the collection when he arrived in 1876. Gifts came from many sources including authors and publishers. Leeper drew heavily upon the old world in his quest to build a first-rate library and solicited donations of imprints from the University presses of Oxford, Cambridge and Dublin, as well as between 1858 and 1875, and from the widow of the Revd Dr Cusack Russell of the Wannon district of Victoria. All these titles are recorded with delicate penmanship in the original catalogue which was compiled in 1879 by T.R. Lewers, the first of the student librarians who were to contribute their talents to maintaining the collections.9 In 1882 a most valuable benefaction came to Trinity when George William Rusden, at a time of personal crisis and frail health, presented Trinity with his book collection of 1500 volumes including remarkable works of Australiana. The gift necessitated the creation of a new hand-written catalogue, a task Dr Leeper himself undertook with infinite care, helped by his first wife, Adeline. 10 His Introduction expressed the importance he attached to the work: This catalogue has been prepared for the members of Trinity College at the cost of much labour. It is hoped that students and others using the Library will by a 4
James Grant, Perspective of a Century: A Volume for the Centenary of Trinity College, Melbourne 1872-1972 (Melbourne: Trinity College Council, 1972), p.82. Many details relating to the early history of the library were first compiled by Bishop Grant and are gratefully acknowledged here. 5 It was originally intended that the head of the College should be called the Provost, but for legal reasons this title was never actually used. See Grant, Perspective of a Century, op.cit., p.9, and Trinity College Calendar, 1897, pp.91-95. I would like to thank Dr Robin Sharwood, Fourth Warden, for his guidance on this matter. 6 As listed by Sir Keith Hancock, see Grant, Perspective of a Century, op.cit., p.26. 7 John Poynter, Doubts and Certainties: A Life of Alexander Leeper (Melbourne: Melbourne University Press, 1997), p.38. 8 Ibid, p.14. 9 The bookplate is inscribed: ‘The first Catalogue of the College Library, prepared by T.R. Lewers, an undergraduate member of the College, presented by the Lord Bishop of Melbourne, January 7th 1874.’ The fly leaf reads : The Bishop of Melbourne, with the affectionate regards of his old and sincerely attached friend, George Spence, Lee, Blackheath, 27 Dec. 1855. 10 The three-volume catalogue was exhaustively detailed and a labour of love. 3
scrupulous observance of the Regulations ensure that the work shall not have been done in vain.
Encouraged by Rusden's handsome gift and in the light of the precarious state of the College's finances, Leeper implored Trinity's benefactor in a letter dated March 4, 1882,11 to seek out further publications for the library. His letter reflects Leeper's awareness of being on the distant edge of British civilization: As you have already rendered our struggling College such invaluable services, I feel sure that you would be glad to help us further in any possible way. As you are about to visit England, may I suggest to you, that you might perhaps be able to obtain for us the publications of some of the literary and scientific societies at home, which are issued more for the diffusion of knowledge than on strictly commercial principles. I refer to such associations as the Royal Society, the Geographical Society, the Royal Colonial Institute, the Royal Geological Society of England, with many others... The one thing that prevents us from obtaining the published proceedings of these societies is the `want of pence'... Such works as I speak of would if they were sent there be studied, appreciated, treasured. Will you take any opportunity you can of saying a good word for us, Very truly yours, Alex Leeper.
Other gifts followed during Leeper's wardenship. The Trinity library was indebted to the generosity of many private donors. Memorial bookplates including the Moule, Bage, Harper, Palmer, and Carse families, today bear witness to the lives of Trinity members killed in action during World War I. A further memorial donation came in gratitude for the work of Adeline Leeper from her father, Sir George Wigram Allen, who in 1921 bequeathed a special fund to buy books ‘in memory of the help given by Adeline Marian Leeper wife of the first Warden in preparing the Library Catalogue which was in use from 1885 to 1920’.12 By 1920, with a lessening of emphasis on classical studies and with more students at both Trinity and Janet Clarke Hall, then the Women's Hostel of Trinity, the second Warden, Sir John Behan decided that the collection needed recataloguing in accordance with modern principles. This was done, to Dr Leeper’s great chagrin. A.B.Foxcroft, Chief Cataloguer to the Public Library, acted as Honorary Cataloguer to the College in the long vacation of 1921-22, transferring the classification to the Dewey system, and in the process discovered two incunabula.13 These were the works of Lactantius, printed at Venice in 1478 [i.e.1479] 14 and the Ficinus edition of Plato, in Latin, printed at 11
See Rusden Papers, Leeper Library. This dedication was inscribed on the presentation book plate placed in the works given in her memory. They included a 27- volume Variorum edition of Shakespeare, ed. H.H. Furness (Philadelphia: Lippincott, 1913). 13 As Foxcroft explained ‘incunabula’ is the name given to books printed in the fifteenth century, in the very infancy of printing, and before the art had emerged, as it were, from the cradle, and divested itself of its swaddling clothes, its ‘incunabula’. See Albert B. Foxcroft, ‘Incunabula in the College Library’, Fleur-de-Lys, v.3 no.22, 1922, p.17. 14 Lactantius, Lucius Coelius Firmianus, Opera [with other tracts] (Venice: Andreas de Paltasidis and Boninus de Boninis, 1478 [i.e.1479]). A.B.Foxcroft, ‘Incunabula in the College Library’, op.cit., pp.16-18 explained why the date of publication of the Lactantius varied. The colophon at the end of the book gives the date as March 12, 1478, (according to the calendar used by the Venetian printer Andreas of Paltasichis ‘who obligingly gives the name of the contemporary doge’) but according to our calendar is really March 22, 1479. 12
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Venice in 1491.15 As a result of his work, he subsequently undertook to enumerate all the incunabula in Melbourne libraries, finding sixty in all.16 The work of Foxcroft stood as a benchmark in the bibliographical work of the College until a national project was established in 1978 to list comprehensively all pre-1801 imprints in Australian libraries.17 Valuable work by bibliographic scholars revealed the full extent of Trinity's early imprints. Trinity is listed in the Australia's Book Heritage Resources Project (ABHR) inventory as having, in addition to the two incunabula, 331 items printed before 1801, including 28 pre-1640 titles (STC)18 and 85 pre-1700 titles (Wing)19 and a further 10 titles not located in either STC or Wing.20 The considerable reputation Trinity's library had attained among Melbourne's bibliographers by the 1920s stood Foxcroft in good stead when he applied for the position of Librarian of the University of Melbourne. The fact that he had worked on the rare book collection at Trinity proved an important factor in his selection as the candidate who possessed the highest qualifications for the position: [Mr Foxcroft] has an exceptionally large experience in all kinds of library work, and has been, for many years, Chief Cataloguer to the Melbourne Public Library... he carried out the reorganization of the library of Trinity College; he thereby gained experience of an unusual character, which would be of special value to the University at present .21
Many of the works which Foxcroft catalogued belonged in Rusden's collection, which was characterised by those curious rarities beloved of the adventurous, if random, spirit of the nineteenth-century collector. The idiosyncratic nature of Rusden's gift is best described in terms of the man himself. George William Rusden (1819-1903)22 historian, educationist and civil servant, former agent of the National Schools Board, and enthusiastic Anglican, epitomised the qualities Dr Leeper admired in a 15
Plato, Opera [Latin translation by] Marsilius Ficinus (Venice: Bernardinus de Choris and Simon de Luere, for Andreas Torresanus, 1491). 16 A.B.Foxcroft, ‘Incunabula in the College Library’, op.cit., p.16. 17 Ross Harvey, ‘Australia’s Book Heritage Resources Project: Final Report, 25 August 1994’, in Bibliographical Society of Australia and New Zealand Bulletin, v.18 no.4, 1994, p.225. 18 A.W.Pollard and G.R. Redgrave, A Short Title Catalogue of Books printed in England Scotland and Ireland and of English Books printed abroad 1475-1640 (London: 1926). 19 D.Wing, Short Title Catalogue of Books printed in England, Scotland, Ireland, Wales and British America, and of English Books printed in other countries, 1641-1700. 2nd ed. ( New York: Index committee of the Modern Language Association of America, 1972-94). 20 B.N.Gerrard, ‘STC and Wing Items in the Leeper Library, Trinity College, University of Melbourne’, in Bibliographical Society of Australia and New Zealand Bulletin, v.5 1981, pp.29- 31. 21 See University of Melbourne, General Library Minute Book, v.3, 1926-1946, Meeting no.1, 19 March 1926, appendix entitled ‘Report of the Committee. appointed to examine and report on the applications for the position of University Librarian’ quoted by Lucy Edwards in ‘Leigh Scott and the Formative Years of the University of Melbourne Library 1926-1945’, in Instruction and Amusement: Papers from the 6th Australian Library History Forum, ed. by B.J.McMullin (Melbourne: Ancorna Press, 1996), p.138. Edward notes that Foxcroft withdrew from the position of Librarian-elect in 1926 and remained at the Public Library to work on the valuable and rare Sticht collection. 22 Ann Blainey and Mary Lazarus, ‘George William Rusden’, Australian Dictionary of Biography, v.6, 1851-1890, R-Z (Melbourne: Melbourne University Press, 1976), pp.73-4. 5
book collector. He was eclectic in his tastes, encyclopaedic in his knowledge, and staunchly partisan in his support for causes. He was a prodigious collector of autographs and of newspaper cuttings of events of the day. His original gift was augmented in 1903 when he bequeathed 50 ‘scrapbook’ volumes in which were bound his pamphlets and newspaper cuttings, as well as other papers. They reflect his life and work, the most valuable items being works relating to Australian discovery, exploration and development, which he had collected or had been given during his time in public office. Rusden's historical writings were judged harshly by his contemporaries,23 but ‘with their breadth of scale his histories were a major cultural achievement of the colonial period, particularly notable for his belief that the history of Australasia did not begin with Europeans. He had deep knowledge of and sympathy with the native peoples of Australasia.’24 Rusden's interests, and friendships cultivated with important people, are mirrored within the collection. There is a complete set of the works of Carlyle, a personal friend. Rusden's kindness to Charles Dickens' sons Alfred and Edward when they came to Australia is revealed in personal letters he exchanged with Dickens between 1865 and 1870. Alfred Dickens emigrated in 1865, became a stock and station agent in Hamilton, Victoria, then moved to Melbourne in 1882. He died in the United States in 1912. Edward arrived in 1869 and settled in Wilcannia, which he represented as a Member of the Legislative Assembly between 1889 and 1894. He died in Moree in 1902. Charles Dickens' own appreciation of Rusden's support for his two sons was shown in his gift to Rusden of a beautiful Chapman and Hall 26-volume set of his works, with sketches by ‘Phiz’. In the front of volume one of Pickwick Papers is pasted a holograph letter written by Charles Dickens to Rusden, dated 23rd September 1868, stating Let me beg you to give them [the best printed edition of my books] a place on your shelves as an assurance of my friendship and grateful regard.
Rusden's collection also includes 22 letters to and from his friend Anthony Trollope between 18711880. Among the letters is one from Rusden dated 8 May 1881 making Trollope his literary executor if he did not live to superintend the publication of his History of New Zealand and History of Australia. Trollope later supported Rusden's controversial History of Australia (published in 1883). Other letters and documents in Rusden's care, and preserved in the Trinity collection, relate to the history of Port Jackson, and include a holograph letter from Governor Arthur Phillip to Viscount Sydney in 1798, and from the explorer George Bass to Governor King in 1802, a year before his last voyage on the Venus. There are also many volumes by and about General ‘Chinese’ Gordon of Khartoum, a hero Rusden had himself met in China and later championed zealously against the opprobrium of Gladstone. 25 Shakespeare was another enthusiasm shared by Rusden and Leeper. Rusden helped to found a Shakespeare scholarship at the University of Melbourne, a Shakespeare Society and Shakespeare prizes for children. The Trinity Library collection contains Rusden's own study of William Shakespeare: his life, his works, and his teaching (Melbourne) 1903.
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A.Blainey and M.Lazarus, ‘George William Rusden’, op.cit., p.74. Ibid, p.74. 25 The library’s copy of Gordon’s Journals (London: Kegan Paul, Trench, 1885) contains a handwritten note by his sister, including ‘the last words in the last letter to me’ from Khartoum: C ‘ .G.Gordon. P.S.- I am quite happy, thank God: and, like Lawrence, I have tried to do my duty.’ 24
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It is appropriate that one of the gems of the library should be a copy of the Second Folio of 1632. Leeper set out to pursue the exact bibliographic details of the Shakespeare Second Folio the year after Rusden's work was published by sending the volume to the British Museum for verification. A letter inside the front cover of the Second Folio addressed to Dr Leeper, dated June 9th 1904, from the Keeper of Manuscripts at the British Museum, reads: Dear Sir, Your Shakespeare arrived two days ago considerably later than your letter on the subject. One of my colleagues in the department of Printed Books has examined it carefully, and reports that it is, as you have always supposed, a copy of the Second Folio, with the exception of the last leaf, which is from the Third Folio. You will notice that the top outer corner of this leaf has been torn off, no doubt in order to conceal the fact that the pagination did not correspond with that of the rest of the volume. About half of the preliminary matter is wanting, the most important leaves being among those which have disappeared. Of course this will affect the pecuniary value of the book very considerably, and my colleague remarks that ‘the œ50for which the book was insured is probably quite as much as it is worth’. I mention this, not because I suppose you would wish to sell the volume or because its real value as evidence for the text of Shakespeare is in any way affected, but merely because the detail may be of interest to you. I am returning the book separately as an insured parcel, Your sincerely, F.G. Kenyon (Head of MSS Department).
Rusden's eye for books stemmed from his boyhood friendship with ‘that prince of bookcollectors’26 Henry Huth, (1815- 1878), as they had both attended the school of Rusden's father, the Reverend George Keylock Rusden at Leith Hill in Surrey, England. Huth grew into a famous bibliophile whose own collection was studded with little-known Victorian curiosities. A merchantbanker with the dedication of a born book collector, he devoted the last thirty years of his life to hunting for rare books. According to his entry in the Dictionary of National Biography, ‘he began to call daily at all the principal booksellers on his way back from the city, a habit which he continued up to the day of his death’.27 He confined himself to no particular subject, like Rusden, but bought anything of real interest provided that the book was perfect [i.e. complete] and in good condition. Huth is important to the Trinity library through his connection with Rusden. It is likely that many of the books in the Rusden collection were inspired by Huth's example. Huth's collection was rich in voyages, Shakespearean and early English literature, and Bibles, ‘including nearly every edition especially prized by collectors’. Henry Huth began writing his own catalogue late in life, but finding it too time-consuming, he employed W.C. Hazlitt and F.S.Ellis to do most of the work. Huth died suddenly in 1878, and the work was published in four volumes in 1880 under the title The Huth Library Catalogue of printed books, manuscripts, autograph letters, and engravings, collected by Henry Huth, with collations and bibliographical descriptions. Elected to membership of the Philobiblon Society in 1863, Huth also printed for presentation to the members a number of works. He gave Rusden a 26
Albert B.Foxcroft ‘Some interesting books in the Leeper Library’, Fleur-de-Lys, v.3 no.21, 1921, p.17. Foxcroft wrote an amusing article for the students on rare and curious books he discovered, including Dr Johnson’s Dictionary , 7th ed. (London: Rivington, 1785), and Richard Bentley’s Dissertations Upon the Epistles of Phalaris and Others, (London: 1883). 27 Dictionary of National Biography, ed. Sidney Lee, v.28 (London: Smith, Elder & Co., 1891), p.347. 7
copy of his Prefaces, Dedications, and Epistles, selected from Early English Books, 1540-1701 affectionately inscribing it to Rusden as ‘friend of my boyhood’. The inscription states that if Rusden were to take the book to Melbourne, ‘it would be the only copy South of the Equator’. Rusden presented the book to Trinity ‘charging the authorities there to keep the [Huth Library] Catalogue in juxtaposition to the small volume [of Prefaces] containing Henry Huth's autograph letter to me’. Dr Leeper honoured Rusden's request in writing, dated on November 17, 1900, on the flyleaf of volume 1 of the Huth Catalogue, and the work is still shelved next to the Prefaces in the Muniments Room of the College. Having established his own College library, Dr Alexander Leeper, as a Trustee of the Public Library of Victoria, promoted the foundation of a national library association. Contemporary library publications give some idea of the unformed state of librarianship in Victoria which confronted Alexander Leeper in the years before and after his appointment to Trinity in 1876. In November 1894, ‘on the motion of Dr Leeper, the Trustees of the Public Library of Victoria determined to take steps towards the foundation of a Library Association of Australasia, on lines generally similar to those of the Library Association of the United Kingdom and the American Library Association.’28 Two years later, on 21st April 1896, eighty delegates from libraries throughout the Australian colonies met in Melbourne for the first Intercolonial Library Conference in Australasia, and those present formed themselves into an Association, adopted a Constitution, and enrolled two hundred and seventy six members.29 Dr Leeper, a ‘scholar librarian’, and his fellow Trustees, were aware of the task ahead of them in 1896: The fact that out of over 100 libraries throughout these Colonies less than onetenth of them are members of the Association shows how much missionary work has yet to be done to kindle the library spirit... and to arouse some enthusiasm among even large city libraries who seem to be unconscious of their pitiful isolation and its attendant disadvantages.30
Dr Leeper remained at the forefront of the Association during its short life, being elected a member of its Victorian Branch. He presented a paper on ‘A Great Irish Library’ at the Sydney Meeting in October 1898, revealing several important attitudes which were to influence the development of the Leeper Library. He dreamed of establishing a classical bastion in the Antipodes, of spreading the values of a humanist education, and of encouraging altruism. His awareness of the lamentably raw state of civilization in the colonies and his vision for his own library at Trinity lies behind his comment that The Library of Dublin University... one of the great libraries of Europe, and twin-sister of the Bodleian ... had been accumulating its treasures for nearly two hundred years, while kangaroo and opossum were still in possession of the spot where this learned conference is now holding its meeting.31
Ever vigilant with an eye to colonial philanthropists, he described how splendid gifts and literary treasures were not wanting to Trinity College Dublin Library. The chief glory of the library was ‘the 28
Library Association of Australasia, Proceedings of the Sydney Meeting, October, 1898, p.3. The Association lasted only until 1902. Another Australian Library Association was formed in 1928. Ibid, p.3. 29 Ibid, p.3. 30 Ibid. p.3. 31 Ibid, p.44. 8
most beautiful book in the world’, the famous Book of Kells, the eighth century manuscript of the Gospels in Latin, decorated with interlace designs of marvellous richness and minuteness. In view of the tradition at Dublin University that the Chief Librarian was chosen for scholarship and not technical knowledge, Leeper suggested Perhaps it is not so important [for a librarian to be a man of learning] as it is to understand library management. Yet surely learning is eminently desirable in a librarian - indeed all kinds of learning, and the more of every kind the better.32
Dr Leeper concluded that ‘whether with or without a University, the beneficent influence of such a library as the Dublin University Library upon the intellectual and spiritual life of a community could scarcely be over-estimated’.33 When the Library Association held its second general meeting in Adelaide in October, 1900 Dr Leeper once again stood before his professional colleagues to lionise a ‘Scholar-Librarian’, Henry Bradshaw, the late Librarian of Cambridge University. 34 Bradshaw had been a book-hunter, and discoverer of lost literary treasures, including poems of Chaucer, portions of Caxton's earliest works, and the oldest Christian kalendar in existence. ‘It is only the scholarly librarian who can hope to have in his life anything of the romance of literary discovery.’35 Dr Leeper described how he himself had made a very small ‘Find’ of his own in the Trinity library, of a sermon, by Dr Sacheverell, a sermon which had been condemned to be burnt by the common hangman, for containing treasonable opinions.36 The character of the Trinity College collection reflects Dr Leeper's beliefs in the need to hold excellent works of reference and classical texts and serials in the Antipodes. He believed in high standards in public libraries: It appears to me that the first thing at which a Public Library should aim is to provide the best and most expensive works of reference - those that are necessarily beyond the means of the poor student or the ordinary citizen: the very best encyclopaedias, dictionaries, grammars, atlases; the very best editions of the classical authors of all countries and the very best technical and scientific treatises by acknowledged authorities.37
Leeper also expressed a visionary belief that the ‘new librarianship’ would bring about closer relations between public libraries and educational institutions, which would in turn have a humanising influence within the community. The tradition of the centrality of the classics and languages in particular, established during Leeper's wardenship, was preserved through a gift from his family in 1946 of part of his personal library which enriched the collection with notable classical and philological serials. The power of the classics 32
Ibid, p.49. Ibid, p.50 34 A. Leeper, ‘A Scholar-Librarian’, Library Association of Australasia, Transactions and Proceedings, 2nd General Meeting, Adelaide, October 9th, 10th, 11th and 12th, 1900, pp.lx-lxv. 35 Library Association of Australasia, op.cit. 1900, p.lxii. 36 The ‘find’ was some loose sheets which turned out to belong to the original edition of the famous sermon preached by Dr Sacheverell before the Lord Mayor at St Paul’s Cathedral on November 5th, 1709, on ‘The Perils of False Brethren in Church and State’. Dr Leeper also described this ‘find’ and others in a letter entitled ‘Literary ‘Finds’ in Melbourne’, published in the Argus, 15th February 1902. 37 Library Association, op.cit.,1900, p.48-9. 33
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as an essential field of study has diminished, but following the terms of his Will, his long runs of serials were bequeathed to the library in 1946. They included the Journal of Roman Studies, Journal of Hellenic Studies, Classical Review and the American Journal of Philology and most of the titles have been maintained to the present day through subscription. Juvenal, the subject of Dr Leeper's own considerable research, is also particularly well-represented in over fifty editions.38 When Dr Leeper retired as Warden of Trinity in 1918, the College library was named the Leeper Library in recognition of his work, and a tablet inscribed in Latin commemorating his services was unveiled.39 After his retirement, Leeper continued his interest in the library and bequeathed an Endowment Fund of £500 in 1934. From the beginning the spatial constraints under which the library operated were recognised and in the 1930's the Council voiced its awareness of the need for a new library. It was not until 1945 that a first step was taken when the Council approved the conversion of the Warden's Lodge to educational purposes. The library moved from its two downstairs rooms in the Warden's Lodge to three upstairs rooms. Four years later, in 1949 Dr Arthur Eustace South, a former Senior Student, bequeathed the residue of his estate (£7,000) ‘in order to commemorate the many kindnesses he had received from Dr Alexander Leeper’ to ‘place a memorial window in the new Leeper Library, and to furnish the new library when built’.40 Although the plan to build a new library was not to reach fruition for almost another fifty years, the bequest made possible the splendid refurnishing of the library rooms.41 It was at this time that the original Leeper Library Room (Leeper Lecture Room) was transformed into a Muniments Room to house the rare book collection. A new representation of the College Crest was created in stained glass high on the southern wall as a memorial to Dr Leeper, and below it in the bay window stood the bust of Sir Redmond Barry, set on a pedestal taken from a column of ancient Rome, given by Sir William Clarke. Bishop Perry's bookcases containing the valuable Rusden and Atkinson collections of Australiana,42 together with the growing Trinitiana collection, lined the eastern and western walls. The Atkinson collection, a second valuable Australiana collection which augmented the Rusden, was bequeathed to the College in 1954. It belonged to Evelyn Leigh Atkinson, of Ravenswood Estate, Bendigo, and Fersfield, Gisborne. Atkinson had studied at Rugby, Oxford and the Middle Temple and collected with vision across the wide field of Australiana from early exploration to post-colonial expansion. He wished his fine collection to go to an institution rather than private collectors and through a family friend, the Reverend J. Hollins Allen, vicar of Gisborne, Trinity became the beneficiary. 43 Added to the Rusden collection, the Atkinson collection furnished Trinity with a notable spread of works which richly chronicle the British past, from the early voyages of William Dampier published in 1698, and of Captain James Cook published in 1843 onwards. Editions of the journals and 38
The second catalogue, compiled by Dr Leeper and his wife, contains over 50 entries for Juvenal. Leeper published an edition and translation of Thirteen Satires of Juvenal with Professor H.A. Strong in 1882, and a new edition in 1912, ‘which included for the first time a ‘respectable’ translation of the ribald Sixth Satire’. John Poynter, Doubts and Certainties: A Life of Alexander Leeper, op.cit., pp.76, 107, 355. 39 The tablet was re-located to the foyer of the new library in the Evan Burge Building on 19 April 1996. 40 James Grant, Perspective of a Century, op.cit., p.84. 41 The bequest was supplemented by a grant from the Australian Universities’ Commission. Ibid, p.84. 42 Ibid, p.84. 43 The Atkinson collection was given ‘by his widow through the good offices of the Vicar of Gisborne, the Reverend J. Hollins Allen’. Ibid, p.84. 10
certain letters of the founding fathers, Governors Phillip, Hunter and King,44 and other officers of the First Fleet, including Watkin Tench, and surgeon John White are represented. A valuable bibliographic and historic continuity is maintained in the Atkinson collection with works covering the years of Governors Bligh and Macquarie, 1806-1823, and an edition of the first published work by an Australian-born writer, W.C.Wentworth, A statistical, historical and political description of the colony of New South Wales, in its second edition of 1820. Several editions of the voyages of George Barrington, first published in 1810, coastal explorations of James Kingston Tuckey ‘to establish a colony at Port Philip [sic] in Bass's Strait in 1802-04’, and the heroic overland explorations of Ludwig Leichhardt (including Bunce's edition of 1859), John McDouall Stuart in 1861-62, Robert O'Hara Burke (in Jackson's edition of 1862), Ernest Giles in 1872-74, and many others are also represented in fine editions. Atkinson collected lavishly illustrated ‘plate books’ concerned both with natural history published by Australian and English scientists, and with life in the colonies. These plate books were the coffee table books popular towards the end of the eighteenth century and into the nineteenth century. Bischoff's Sketch of the History of Van Diemen's Land of 1832, and John Gould's magnificent An Introduction to the Birds of Australia, 1848, and the views of Joseph Lycett, Augustus Earle and George French Angas are also held. Popular books on life in the colonies include Augustus Prinsep's Journal of a voyage... with extensive vignettes of Tasmanian scenery, 1833, and Louisa Anne Meredith's Notes and Sketches, 1844. Later nineteenth-century works on the goldfields, and popular books of views and of life in the colonies published by John Sands cover the period of phenomenal growth and civic pride within Victoria's colonial history. Following the donation of the Atkinson collection, the next notable development in the history of the Trinity library came when a law collection was established. The Lower Bishops' Tutors' Study was designated as a separate law library in 1958 through the work of Mr Peter Balmford. The collection was augmented through the gift of F.F. Knight with an extensive range of law reports. By the mid-1960's the role of college libraries, together with all libraries in Australia, came under scrutiny. 45 The fourth Warden, Dr Robin Sharwood, made a timely decision that the library and its collections, especially at undergraduate level, were in need of systematic review. Care of the library, formerly entrusted to honorary library tutors, was placed in the hands of a part-time professional librarian in 1965, followed in 1966 by the first full-time professional appointment of Miss Mary Rusden as College Librarian, great- niece of G.W.Rusden. A Library Committee which included students and tutors was established to make recommendations to the Warden and Librarian and to report on library matters to the College Council. A quinquennial survey which followed in 1970 revealed that although progress had been made in achieving a more balanced undergraduate collection, continuing reliance on the generosity of private benefactors contrived to bring a somewhat haphazard character to the collection. While the library was strong in the humanities, especially classics, theology, history and law, there was, and still is
44
The Rusden Papers include Governor King’s Proclamation of the Castle Hill Uprising in 1802. John Balnaves wrote ‘Many of the college libraries have benefited from donations of important material, but in general they have insufficient funds for the development of even minimum collections for undergraduate needs. They are mostly poorly housed, and very few of them are controlled by qualified librarians.’ See his Australian Libraries, (Melbourne: Cheshire, 1966), p.59. Balnaves goes on to quote Maurice F Tauber who had suggested in 1964 that ‘a re examination of their [i.e. college libraries’] function would be beneficial to the libraries themselves and also to the development programme of the university libraries of the country’. See his Resources of Australian Libraries, prepared for the Australian Advisory Council on Bibliographical Services, with the assistance of the librarians of Australia and the Bibliographical Centre of the National Library (Canberra: AACOBS, 1962-64). 45
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today, a relative sparseness in the sciences, engineering and other disciplines which have increasingly replaced the humanist emphasis of university teaching over the twentieth century. Dr Sharwood's leadership in library matters inspired benefactors. Gifts came from the estate of Maurice Hurry to the general collection; from Barry Russell Marshall, College Chaplain between 1962 and 1969, to the theological collection; from the Myer Foundation to the humanities collection;46 and from Colin Caldwell to the Fine Arts collection. Colin Caldwell's gift of books of 1969 heralded a greater benefaction. In 1989, under the fifth Warden, Dr Evan Burge, a dramatic change in the library's fortunes came when the Caldwell Bequest was established, giving the library the freedom to embark on a systematic annual acquisitions policy based on assured funding. Undergraduate course needs could better be filled across the curriculum of the University of Melbourne. Besides providing financial help, the bequest included books which augmented the earlier gift of Fine Art volumes given in 1969 by Colin Caldwell. These works had been selected, on the advice of Professor Joseph Burke, Herald Professor of Fine Arts at Melbourne University, specifically to prepare students for ‘the Australian's Grand Tour of Europe’, bearing in mind the needs of students of Architecture, History and Theology. 47 The Caldwell Bequest of 1989 also included books on the decorative arts and splendid imprints on Hogarth and 18th century English art. Also in 1989, the music collection of the College was enriched by a gift of the library of the late Professor Peter Dennison. Himself a scholar of Baroque English music, in particular the work of Pelham Humfrey, his collection contained a set of Musica Britannica and music scores and monographs on English and European composers and performers. The transformation of the Leeper Library into a purpose-designed library in 1996, with provision for state-of-the art computerised systems, saved the collections from potential destruction. Perennial problems associated with increasingly overcrowded bookshelves and mouldering stacks in the Behan basement had beset the collection for many years. Following a recommendation of its Strategy Committee, the College Council decided in 1993 to build a new library. 48 Formerly hidden away in the Leeper building and the stacks, the Leeper Library was refounded on the first floor of the new Evan Burge Building, named for the fifth Warden. Its architectural concept, emphasising light and space, contained elements inspired by other traditional rectangular classical libraries with barrel-vaulted ceilings such as the Long Room at Trinity College Dublin and the Wren Library at Trinity College Cambridge. A series of light-filled alcoves, lined with bookshelves and roomy enough to contain large tables and chairs for private study, were placed around the walls. An important role for the new library, in addition to housing the College collections, has been to provide space for and access to the Mollison library. Founded in memory of Alexander Fullarton Mollison by his sister Elizabeth on 29 May, 1893, the Mollison library was intended for the use of 46
In 1968-1970 the Myer Foundation Grant provided the following: The Revised Reports [Law reports], standard sets of Charles Dickens, Jane Austen, Virginia Woolf, C.S.Lewis, Scott Fitzgerald, works by Spencer and Gillen to complete the sets of Spencer in the Australiana collection, five volumes in the Oxford Companion series, a photostat copy of the Report of the Select Committee on Transportation, 1812, W. Tench’s Sydney’s first four years, National Trust Victoria’s historic buildings, Freeland Australian architecture, and Lockhart’s Anatomy of the human body. See Trinity College Archives, Library folder 408. 47 Professor Burke, Herald Professor of Fine Arts at the University of Melbourne had recommended to Dr Sharwood that this could be the basis for a useful and profitable Fine Arts section of a College Library which could never hope to cover the field. See Trinity College Library Archives, 1970. 48 The Evan Burge Building was funded by money generated through the Trinity Education Centre, which shared the use the ground floor for teaching. 12
the clergy and licensed readers of the Diocese of Melbourne. In 1967, following negotiations with the College, the ‘Mollison’ was moved from St Paul's Cathedral Buildings to Trinity to release much-needed space for diocesan administration. Shelved for some time in the Lower Bishops' Lecture Room, it offered a broad range of theological reading. Its first holdings of standard Anglican theology from the seventeenth and eighteenth century were gradually expanded to include Anglican spirituality, and also History, Biography and Australian Anglicanism, covering books, periodicals and newspapers. There is a complete run of the Colonial Church Chronicle, the Melbourne Church of England Messenger, and the definitive collection of Moorhouse Lectures.49 Later the general Mollison collection was housed in Room 3 of the Leeper building, with the Australiana Annexe sequestered in closed access in other buildings of the College, until the new library became home to both parts of the Mollison collection in 1996. The Mollison library collection also contains early treasures. Alexander Mollison and G.W.Rusden were ‘intimate friends’50 having sailed from England in the same ship in 1833 and landed in Sydney in 1834.51 Perhaps the most significant Anglican liturgical text in the Mollison collection is a copy of the rare 1660 Book of Common Prayer. The acquisition was recorded in the Argus of November 17, 1913 under the heading ‘An ancient volume’. The article explained that when Cromwell assumed the Protectorate in 1653 the Church of England as the representative of the State religion lost its power, and the use of the Book of Common Prayer was prohibited. With the accession of Charles II in 1660 the Church regained its ascendancy, and the Prayer Book was again in demand. But many copies had been lost or destroyed, and the bishops prepared a new edition, to be issued in 1662. To meet the immediate demand Robert Barker, ‘printer to the King's most excellent Majestie’ issued an edition , printed perhaps from the old type of the 1604 edition. Very little has been found out about of this edition, and only three or four known copies exist. The Mollison volume is one of them, brought to Melbourne from Westmoreland, England. It bears evidence of hasty publication. The names of the Royal family in the Litany prayers have been inserted, as the lettering is different from the original type, and where the duplication of a passage has occurred the page has not been reprinted; one of them has been merely crossed out with a pen. Charles II's arms are on it and the ‘Letanie’ prays for ‘Queen Mary, James Duke of York, and the rest of the Royal progenie’. The type is beautiful, clear and elegant, and the book is embellished with finely designed initials and tailpieces. The collections of the Trinity College Library are important both to the resident and non-resident staff and students of the College and to researchers and scholars. The holdings reflect not only the world-view of the College's early scholars, but also perceptions of Trinity's role and purpose since the foundation of the College in 1872. As part of the national heritage the Leeper Library represents a unique and valuable resource in whose collections lie manuscript and printed evidence to support further Australian scholarship and research.
49
The Moorhouse lectures were named for James Moorhouse, Bishop of Melbourne, 1877-1886. He was considered the greatest of Melbourne’s Anglican bishops and was involved in attracting a group of candidates to the new Trinity Faculty of Theology, and also in the building of St Paul’s Cathedral. 50 Rusden’s description, in a handwritten note of 12 November 1898 at the top of a letter from Governor Denison, dated 19 July 1844. Rusden Papers, Trinity College Library. 51 A detailed history is recorded in James Grant, The Mollisons and Their Library, an address delivered in the Mollison Library, Trinity College on Saturday 29 May 1993, being the Centenary of the opening of the Library by the Bishop of Melbourne the Rt Revd Field Flowers Goe. Typescript in the Leeper Library.
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