Although at the beginning of the project Romilly insisted on a print run of 1,500 for each volume, this proved greatly over-optimistic in terms of sales, and 750 became the normal figure. The retail price per volume was initially 8s. 6d., later rising to 10s. Initial sales figures for each volume generally reached something over 200 copies: this left considerable surplus stock, and so in the 1880s William Hardy, as Deputy Keeper, introduced the practice of presenting free copies to reputable public and university libraries, with a label inserted stating that "in the event of the Library being broken up", the volume should be returned to the Controller of Her Majesty's Stationery Office.