(Bookselling) Autographed Letter Signed To Mr. William Gowans, October 15, 1869 -

. A fascinating small letter to Mr. William Gowans (1803-1870) the legendary bookseller in old New York whose obituary in the New York Times described him as "the antiquarian bookseller of Nassau Street" who in forty years of bookselling had acquired over 250,000 books from Caxtons and an extensive group of Aldine works in a large Venice section to rarities in large stacks where customers could only approach with a sperm oil lamp since there was as of yet no other lighting.. The Dictionary of Antiquarian Booksellers notes that his executors had sold eight tons as scrap while 60,000 lots of books and ephemera were sold at auction. In this letter a customer returns three items send on approval with the note: "Mr. Gowans, Dear Sir. I thank you for sending me the three books to examine. I already have copies of Bunyan's Poems and Dr. De Witt's Ari course[?]. The desire for prooffering the Butler has passed away. I am not the least obliged to you for offering this cheap copy. Yours very truly, I. Lenox". Whether Mr. Gowans' death a year later can be attributed to this piece of tripe, we cannot tell; however, after reading the marvelous obituaries in the American Bibliopolists, the Dictionary of American Bookman, and in Andrews, Booksellers of Old New York, I can only commiserate with the very late Mr. Gowans that he had to deal with such customers as the now long forgotten I. Lenox.