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The excerpt represents the core issue or deciding factor on which you must meditate, and is drawn from Enemies of Books by William Blades: as originally issued by the fifteenth-century binder, and a
great fuss (very properly) was made over the treasure trove.
Of course, cries the reader, it was kept in its original covers,
with all the interesting associations of its early state untouched?
No such thing! Instead of making a suitable case, in which it
could be preserved just as it was, it was placed in the hands of a
well-known London binder, with the order, "Whole bind in velvet."
He did his best, and the volume now glows luxuriously in its
gilt edges and its inappropriate covering, and, alas! with
half-an-inch of its uncut margin taken off all round.
How do I know that? because the clever binder, seeing some MS.
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