I acquired a pious book titled Fathers, Martyrs and Queen of the Holy Rosary from a relation I located while doing my family history. She knew my grandparents and had met me in Melbourne with my parents when I was an infant. I do not remember the meeting. She was happy to pass it over to me as I was a closer relative than she to the original owners.
It is perhaps a Roman Catholic alternative to a Protestant family bible. I tend to call it 'the bible' in the absence of a suitable name for it. As a non believer the contents do not speak to me and I suspect for present day believers it represents a fervour of another time. It is inscribed with births, deaths and marriages of some of my 1800's ancestors.
It was handed over in a pretty poor state, the cover boards falling off, end papers torn and spine spit in two. At the time I was learning craft book binding and took it to my recreational class as a project. It took all of one semester to repair the book. The teacher was somewhat intimidated by having to advise on the job until I assured her I was repairing it not restoring it.
Recently I decided to relinquish my book binding craft. The pastime had being in abeyance for some time and I had passed on to new things. The paraphernalia of bookbinding have charm: pretty book cloth, colourful and marbled endpapers, trusty pieces of hard board, spine tape in various hues, brushes and glues. It was a little hard to bundle some for donation and some for disposal.
A legacy of the craft is the 'bible' as well as the books I have re-covered in my library, all with a personalised sticky label attached to the end boards. I attained no great heights of bookbinding. I lacked the dexterity, the artistic talent and drive for perfection. As well I only had a small part-time work desk and none of the larger machines or implements for proper book binding. My projects were salvaged old books or good quality paperbacks rendered more pleasant to look at and handle.
I hope I have ensured that the 'bible' survives another hundred years and is still in the possession of a relative and that he or she may pause a moment to read the legend 'tipped' into the endpapers telling of its discovery and repair by the distant relative long gone.
