Prince Henry, the eldest son of James 1., showed more taste for literary matters than any of his predecessors, although he was much addicted to all manly exercises. He not only took great interest in the books he already found in his father's library, but he materially added to it by further collections of his own. In 1609 he purchased the library of Lord Lumley, who had been his tutor, and which was the finest then in England, except that of Sir Robert Cotton. This library had originally belonged to Henry Fitz-Alan, Earl of Arundel, Lord Lumley's father-in-law, and it had been largely increased since his death. Prince Henry only possessed the library for three years, as he died in 1612, but during this time he made many important additions to it. Not many of the original bindings .remain upon the Earl of Arundel's books, and those that do are usually simple. There is one specimen in the British Museum that is especially good; it bears a "cameo" of a white horse, galloping, with an oak spray in his mouth, in an oval medallion, and if there were many others like it, Prince Henry destroyed much beautiful work when he had them rebound.

It must be supposed that the bindings of both Lord Arundel's and Lord Lumley's collection were in a bad state when Prince Henry acquired them, as they now are almost invariably in bindings that were made for him after 1610, when he was made Prince of Wales. On the Prince's death, his library, which was then kept at St. James's, reverted to the king, and served largely to augment the old royal library, which had not been very carefully kept up to the present time, and which, even afterwards, suffered various losses.

The majority of Prince Henry's rebinding are designed in a fashion which has been very adversely criticized, but nevertheless they are not all without interest. The commonest decoration found upon them consists of a large royal coat-of-arms of England within a scroll border with thistles, stamped in gold, having the label of the eldest son in silver. At the corners are very large stamps, crowned double roses, fleurs¬de-lis, lions rampant, all in gold, or the Prince of Wales' feathers in silver. Books bearing this design are more frequently met with outside the large royal collections than any others, as at one time or another many examples have become separated from the rest. But there are other books bound for the Prince the designs on which are often original and effective. Perhaps the best of these is on a copy of Livy's Romana Historia, Avrelire Allobrogvm, 1609 (Fig. 15). I n this instance the Prince of Wales' feathers form the central design, impressed in silver and gold, and with the initials H. P. at the sides of it, all enclosed in a border composed of a dotted ribbon arranged in right angles and segments of circles, enriched at the corners with ornamental arabesques. This design is particularly pleasing, and it is likely that it was executed by the same binder who bound the edition of Thevet's Vies des hommes illustres, described above, for James I., the peculiar design of the dotted ribbon appearing in both instances.

Petrus de Crescentiis, De omnibus agriculturtC partibus, Basilere, 154-8, has the Prince of Wales' feathers in silver, with H. P. at the sides, and on two upright labels the words "0 et presidium I Dulce decus meum." It has very heavy corner-stamps.