February, 1917 
OLD TIME VALENTINES FOR 
25 
THE MODERN COLLECTOR 
yoM may think she’s getting it, but she's 
sending it,—the forward thing! And by 
special messenger! You never can tell 
about these Victorians 
A Timely Note On A Fa d 
Of Y e s t e r d a 
GARDNER 1' E A L L 
While a little puzzling in detail, this val¬ 
entine goes to the heart at once. One feels 
it is the work of a true lover and a gentle¬ 
man. James fecit 
O F the making of valentines there has 
been no end, but of collectors of them 
there have been few'. This second fact per¬ 
haps explains the disappearance of nearly 
all these (juaint missives of Cupid, both 
owing to the ravages of time and to the 
neglect shown them until quite recently. 
There must be many interesting old val¬ 
entines, hocvever, hidden away in forgotten 
trunks and boxes in cavernous attics, and a 
search for them will repay the ardent en¬ 
thusiast over the curious things of the past. 
When the writer started his own collec¬ 
tion some years ago he imagined it would 
Ije comparatively easy for him to hud old 
valentines in the various antique shops, but 
he came to learn that he was far more apt 
to discover the objects of his search in the 
shops of dealers in old prints and auto¬ 
graphs, and occasion¬ 
ally some friendly deal¬ 
er in antique books 
would take the trouble 
to keep a special book 
out of these desiderata. 
Searches (by invita¬ 
tion!) in old attics 
were the most prolific 
ministrants to his hob¬ 
by which leads him to 
suggest such realms to 
other collectors. 
Keeping “Cupid’s 
K.vllendre” 
The origin of St. 
Valentine’s Day ob¬ 
servances is lost in ob¬ 
scurity. Likewise, we 
do not know the date 
of the first engraved or 
printed valentines, 
though we do know 
that the custom of St. 
Valentine’s Day mis¬ 
sives is of ancient date. 
One finds, for instance. 
In spite of her correctly feminine reticule 
and waist measurement, this lady is a 
brazen one, and pursues her lover, too. 
There he is in the scroll 
preserved in the British Aluseum the valen¬ 
tine verses of Charles II D’Orleans, and 
there was John Lydgate’s valentine to Cath¬ 
erine, Henry V’s queen, composed in 1420: 
“Seynte Valentine of custome yeers by yeers. 
Men liave an usuance, in this regionn 
To loke and serche Cupid’s Kallendre, 
And chose theyr choyse as theyr sort doth fade; 
But I love oon which excelleth alle.” 
Then there was Donne’s valentine on the 
occasion of the Princess Elizabeth’s mar¬ 
riage to Frederick, Count Palatine, St. Val¬ 
Quite an elaborate affair is this early example of the embossed English valentine. 
The center picture is in color, and the lover’s knot beneath bears the legend "Forget 
Me Not.’’ She does not seem likely to 
entine’s Day, 1614. It is too interesting to 
be denied reprinting here. 
“Hail, Bishop Valentine, whose day this is; 
All the air is thy diocese. 
And all the chirping choristers 
And other birds are thy parishoners; 
Thou inarryest eveiy year 
The lyric lark and gray whispering dove; 
The sparrow that neglects his life for love, 
The household bird with the red stomacher; 
Thou mak’st the blackbird speed as soon 
As doth the goldfinch or the halcyon— 
This day more cheerfully than ever shine. 
This day which might inflame thyself old 
Valentine.” 
The Victorian era was generous in its out¬ 
put of printed and engraved valentines, with 
which our own has kept pace. But in the 
Georgian days when the demand for valen¬ 
tine missives had not come to be met by 
artistic cards and when the demand for 
“verses” was greater than the supply of in¬ 
dividual ingenuities, the 
enterprising publishers 
of the day brought 
out the sundry chap- 
books, such for in¬ 
stance as “Kemmish’s 
.Annual and Universal 
VUlentine Writer for 
1797,” one of the rarest 
of these little pamph¬ 
lets. Later w’as the 
“Cupid’s Cabinet, or 
Lover’s Pastime,” “The 
Lover’s Companion, or 
Wlentines for Trades,’’ 
‘‘The Tradesman’s 
New AUlentine Writ¬ 
er.” “The Lady’s Val¬ 
entine AI u s e u m , ’ ’ 
whose sub-title defines 
it as “A Choice Selec¬ 
tion of Elegant, Polite, 
AI o d e s t. Ludicrous, 
Sentimental — (Senti¬ 
mental is put in large 
type!) — Valentines 
and Answers.” 
(Continued on page 70) 
