cyclopædias. Out of these I can get information enough to serve my immediate purpose on almost any subject. These, of course, are supplemented by geographical, biographical, bibliographical, and other dictionaries, including of course lexicons to all the languages I ever meddled with. Next to these come the works relating to my one or two specialties, and these collections I make as perfect as I can. Every library should try to be complete on something, if it were only on the history of pin-heads. I don't mean that I buy all the trashy compilations on my special subjects, but I try to have all the works of any real importance relating to them, old as well as new. In the following compartment you will find the great authors in all the languages I have mastered, from Homer and Hesiod downward to the last great English name. This division, you see, you can make almost as extensive or as limited as you choose. You can crowd the great representative writers into a small compass; or you can make a library consisting only of the different editions of Horace, if you have space and money enough. Then comes the Harem, the shelf or the book-case of Delilahs, that you have paid wicked prices for, that you love without pretending to be reasonable about it, and would bag in case of fire before all the rest, just as Mr. Townley took the Clytie to his carriage

when the anti-Catholic mob threatened his house in 1780. As for the foundlings like my Hedericus, they go among their peers; it is a pleasure to take them from the dusty stall where they were elbowed by plebian school-books and battered odd volumes, and give them Alduses and Elzivirs for companions. The Poet at the Breakfast Table.

SCALIGER, GERBELIUS, ORONTIUS ET AL

ROBERT BURTON

Julius Scaliger was so much affected with Poetry, that he brake out into a pathetic protestation, he had rather be the Author of 12 verses in Lucan, or such an ode in Horace, than Emperor of Germany. Nicholas Gerbelius, that good old man, was so much ravished with a few Greek Authors restored to light, with hope and desire of enjoying the rest, that he exclaims forthwith, Arabibus atque Indis omnibus erimus ditiores, we shall be richer than all the Arabick or Indian Princes; of such esteem they were with him, incomparable worth and value. Seneca prefers Zeno and Chrysippus, two doting Stoicks, (he was so much enamoured on their works), before any Prince or General of an Army; and Orontius the Mathematician so far admires Archimedes, that he calls him divinum & homine majorem, a petty God, more than a man;

and well he might, for ought I see, if you respect fame or worth. Pindar of Thebes is as much renowned for his Poems, as Epaminondas, Pelopidas, Hercules, or Bacchus, his fellow citizens, for their warlike actions; et si famam respicias, non pauciores Aristotelis quam Alexandri meminerunt, (as Cardan notes), Aristotle is more known than Alexander; for we have a bare relation of Alexander's deeds, but Aristotle totus vivit in monumentis, is whole in his works: yet I stand not upon this; the delight is it which I aim at; so great pleasure, such sweet content, there is in study. King James, 1605, when he came to our University of Oxford, and, amongst other edifices, now went to view that famous Library, renewed by Sr. Thomas Bodley, in imitation of Alexander, at his departure brake out into that noble speech, If I were not a King, I would be an University man; and if it were so that I must be a prisoner, if I might have my wish, I would desire to have no other prison than that Library, and to be chained together with so many good Authors et mortuis magistris. So sweet is the delight of study, the more learning they have, (as he that hath a Dropsy, the more he drinks the thirstier he is), the more they covet to learn, and the last day is (the pupil of the former;) prioris discipulus; harsh at first learning is, radices amaræ, but fructus dulces, according to that of Isocrates,

pleasant at last; the longer they live, the more they are enamoured of the Muses.

Heinsius, the keeper of the Library at Leyden in Holland, was mewed up in it all the year long; and that which to my thinking should have bred a loathing caused in him a greater liking. I no sooner (saith he) come into the Library, but I bolt the door to me, excluding lust, ambition, avarice, and all such vices, whose nurse is idleness, the mother of ignorance, and Melancholy herself, and in the very lap of eternity, amongst so many divine souls, I take my seat, with so lofty a spirit and sweet content, that I pity all our great ones, and rich men that know not this happiness. I am not ignorant in the meantime (notwithstanding this which I have said) how barbarously and basely for the most part our ruder Gentry esteem of Libraries and Books, how they neglect & contemn so great a treasure, so inestimable a benefit, as Æsop's Cock did the Jewel he found in the dunghill, and all through error, ignorance, and want of education.

AND in a corner of my house, I have Books! The miracle of all my possessions, more wonder

ful than the wishing-cap of the Arabian tales; for they transport me instantly, not only to all places, but to all times. By my books, I can conjure up before me, to vivid existence, all the great and good men of antiquity; and for my individual satisfaction, I can make them act over again the most renowned of their exploits: the orators declaim for me: the historians recite: the poets sing: and from the equator to the pole, or from the beginning of time until now, by my books, I can be where I please. - Elements of Physics.

AN ANTECHAMBER OF GREAT SPIRITS

GEORGE GILFILLAN

THE speaking silence of a number of books, where, though it were the wide Bodleian or Vatican, not one whisper could be heard, and yet, where, as in an antechamber, so many great spirits are waiting to deliver their messages — their churchyard stillness continuing even when their readers are moving to their pages, in joy or agony, as to the sound of martial instruments their awaking, as from deep slumber, to speak with miraculous organ, like the shell which has only to be lifted, and "pleased it remembers its august abodes, and murmurs as the ocean murmurs there" their power of drawing tears, kindling blushes, awaken