THE WORK OF DAVID E. CRONIN ON January ioth, the Society will open an exhibition of the drawings and hand-illustrated books of David Edward Cronin. His art of beautifying books with many headpieces and tailpieces, marginal drawings, and inserted illustrations, in water color or India ink, was encouraged by bibliophiles of the last two decades of the last century. To the generosity of its member, Daniel Parish, Jr., the Society is indebted for the largest collection of Cronin's work owned by any institution or individual book lover. The exhibition will continue through March, 1941, on the third floor, library corridor. From 1879 until his retirement from the field of illustration in 1903, Cronin embellished seventy-five works with his finely- drawn portraits and sketches. These are listed and described in the Bibliography of his work published in Philadelphia in 1903. The preface to that Bibliography tells "Something about the Hand Illustration of Books": To take an uncut and unbound copy of a standard book, either historical or poetical, and after some months' artistic labor upon its margins and blank spaces to make it worth a thousand or more dollars, would be considered a great feat by those who are unfamiliar with the prices obtained for hand-illustrated books. The public at large never sees such volumes. The artist remains unknown, except to a limited number of wealthy book lovers and their friends. His work, incased in tooled levant and lustrous satin, is carefully laid away, to be brought forth only on rare occasions... In hand-illustrated books the bibliophile demands elaboration. Slight sketches will not please him, though for variety a powerful and correct drawing without much finish is often admissible. However, real fervor is apt to be repressed by the danger of spoiling a leaf when, perhaps, the book is nearly finished. For this reason the work of beginners, however good in other fields, shows signs of timidity and feebleness. Concentration of attention and perfect confidence with every stroke of the pen or brush are essential to success in this branch of art. Sometimes in drawing miniature portraits such delicacy of touch is required to secure a likeness that the artist must use a magnifying glass and be careful not to 17