wrote:

The book in question is "Histoire de l'expédition chrestienne au
Royaume de la Chine"

"...entreprinse par les pères de la Compagnie de Jesus ... / tirée des
memoires du R. P. Matthiev Ricci, de la Compagnie de Jesus, par le r.p.
Nicolas Trigault ... et nouvellement traduite en francois par le S. D.
F. de Riquebourg-Trigault"

A valuable book! There are three copies currently being offered on ABE
(http://www.abebooks.com/servlet/SearchEntry), at prices between $8000
and $35000. This would sit nicely in the context of early European
voyages of exploration or of Catholic missionary activities...

In addition to being washed, this book has a 3"x3" cut-out in
the title page and repaired with old paper. This cut-out does
not touch any text in that page.

There is another copy of the book, same edition. However, this
copy has 1-3 worm holes on the margin, without touching texts,
on most (~60%) of the pages.

If it were you, which book would you go for, the one with the
cut-out and being washed or the one with worm holes, if anything
else is equal ?

How about the binding on the wormed copy? How unsightly is the worming?
If it's just two or three small holes it probably wouldn't bother me too
much. Does the washed copy look any the worse for having been washed?
The main thing that tends to happen is that the pages get kind of
warped, so they're wavy or bulgy.

It sounds like a hard call. I think I'd probably go for overall
freshness. Ideally, I'd like to handle both copies so as to be able to
decide which one is the fresher.

John