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No shop is so easily set up as an antiquary's. Like those of the
lowest order of pawnbrokers, a commodity of rusty iron, a bay or
two of hobnails, a few odd shoe-buckles, cashiered kail-pots, and
fire-irons declared incapable of service, are quite sufficient to
set him up. If he add a sheaf or two of penny ballads and
broadsides, he is a great man--an extensive trader. And then,
like the pawnbrokers aforesaid, if the author understands a
little legerdemain, he may, by dint of a little picking and
stealing, make the inside of his shop a great deal richer than
the out, and be able to show you things which cause those who do
not understand the antiquarian trick of clean conveyance to
wonder how the devil he came by them.
It may be said that antiquarian articles interest but few
customers, and that we may bawl ourselves as rusty as the wares
we deal in without any one asking; the price of our merchandise.
But I do not rest my hopes upon this department of my labours
only. I propose also to have a corresponding shop for Sentiment,
and Dialogues, and Disquisition, which may captivate the fancy of
those who have no relish, as the established phrase goes, for
pure antiquity--a sort of greengrocer's stall erected in front of
my ironmongery wares, garlanding the rusty memorials of ancient
times with cresses, cabbages, leeks, and water purpy.
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