Cato and Laelius: or, Essays on Old-Age and Friendship: by Marcus Tullius Cicero. With Remarks by William Melmoth, Esq. A new edition. (Redmond Barry’s copy)

London : J. Dodsley, 1795. Two volumes, octavo (210 mm), original half-calf (worn) over marbled boards (heavily rubbed), joints weak, spines with contrasting leather title pieces (both present) and volume labels (one lacking), pp [viii] (including separate title page for Vol. 1 with engraved portrait of Cato), 318 ; [viii] (including separate title page for Vol. 2 with engraved portrait of Scipio), 344; light foxing to endpapers and preliminaries in both volumes, else contents very clean; a good set with wide margins. From the library of Victorian Supreme Court judge and cultural patron Sir Redmond Barry, his armorial bookplate to pastedown of each volume, with later ownership labels of F. W. Scrivenor below; ownership inscription in pencil of Dott Barry to title page of Volume 2.

Irish-born Sir Redmond Barry (1813-1880) arrived in New South Wales in 1837 and was admitted to the New South Wales bar. After two years in legal practice in Sydney he relocated to the newly established Port Phillip settlement, arriving in Melbourne at the end of 1839. He went on to become the first Solicitor General (1851) and first Supreme Court Judge (1852) of the Colony of Victoria. He was also instrumental in the foundation of the Royal Melbourne Hospital (1848), the University of Melbourne (1853), for which he served as the first chancellor until his death, and the Melbourne Public Library (State Library of Victoria) (1854).

‘Sir Redmond Barry was a great bibliophile and believed strongly in the Victorian-era ideal of self-improvement through the gaining of knowledge. From the early 1840s he opened the small personal library in his home for use by working men and … was instrumental in the founding of the Melbourne Public Library. As a trustee he was to take a very active role in the library’s administration, including the selection of books … Barry was also the driving force behind the founding of the Supreme Court Library and the Victorian Parliamentary Library. On Barry’s death his substantial personal library was dispersed across various public and private collections. Today a number of these books can be found in the collections of the University of Melbourne Library, easily identified by Barry’s distinctive bookplate bearing his crest….’ (Jason Benjamin, Finding Redmond Barry, pp. 3-10 in University of Melbourne Collections, issue 13, December 2013)