The Wellington enterprise. [volume] (Wellington, Ohio) 1867-188?, 1882-04-05

I'm older than look
etc.
London Truth.
THE BRITISH MUSEUM.
A Peep ut an Army of Bookworns-Liter-
sture OF the Dead Past-Forgotten Au-
thors-Egyptian sarcophagi and Funer-
ais.
This is the British Museum, a bit ot
its great front visible through Museum
street, which runs across Oxford
great, gray, damp, massive. and depress-
ing charnellike treasure-house of liter
ature, art and science, full of all the
books ever written by the many un-
known and known authors Of the Brit
ish Empire. Two copies of every book
and pamphlet printed must be deposited
in the British Museum library, behind
whose scenes you are only admitted by
special permit, and whose floors are
iron gratings. Standing on these you
look down on rooms below stored with
tens of thousands of books, and above
your head gridiron-like glimpses
through successive layers of gratings of
rooms above rooms filed with tens and
hundreds of thousands more books
books of all ages; the first and last
printed; books in vellu1n and parch-
ment and of black letter, venerable to
the eye and musty to the nose; books
of long, long ago dead, gone, forgotten
and never-to-be-resuscitated authors,
who grew pale, thin, worn, blear, blind
and hollow-eyed writing for poster
ity." Posterity knows not, nor ever
viii know, their names. Posterity
stands in this charnel-house of dead and
forgotten literature, and, overwhelmed
at these myriads of books above, below,
to right and to left and all about, won-
ders how man can ever dare to write
another book. Books here once deemed
full of wisdom, now known to be full of
nonsense; books once thought to be full
of truth. now known for theory, .drivel,
maundering and conceited guesswork;
novels here, too, by a former age
deemed of fascinating interest, now re-
garded only as duh and ponderous curl
osities of antiquity; books once, thought
airy, light, witty and humorous, now
known as dull, prosy and stupid; Bibles
here, too, treasured with most reverent
care, not because they are Bibles, but
for once having belonged to some wick
ed old King or Queen, who read what
parts of the Scripture which suited
them and dwelt with JUNCTION and salts
faction over the passage Fear God and
honor the King" rejoicing that thus
they had the law and the Lord on their
side.
AN ANCIENT QUEENS BIBLE.
An assistant librarian showed me a
copy of some ancient Queens Bible.
I've forgotten who she was. An Amer
lean sovereign has no time for overload
ing his memory with the names of dead
and gone Queens This Bible was a
small volume in green velvet. was
allowed as great favor to hold it for
q few seconds I didn't realize at first
how great favor it was. held this
extra sacred volume as i would hold
any common Bible Then / saw the
custodian's eye fixed on me with mix
ture of surprise and disgust. / thought
over the bolts and bars which had been
drawn and taken down, and the locks
unlocked ere this Bible could be taken
out, and that this was both royal Bible
and an ancient Bible, and that there
fore the book itself and the truths and
precepts 1t contained were in this Gus
todian's eyes far more weighty than
those in the commoner Bibles owned
by common folks. The man looked as
If he begrudged the wear and tear of the
book from my momentary lingering. So
relieved his mind by handing the pre-
cious volume back to him.
was at the time in the company of q
mighty old Bible hunter-an American
IA part of whose business in Europe
was the buying of very ancient printed
Bibles for that small and wealthy class
of people among us who have passion
for old books. He was in ecstacies that
day, having just secured, as he said, the
oldest Bible in Europe, for which he had
paid, If recollect correctly, $3, 900. He
had purchased it for man in Connecti-
cut, an antiquarian biblical madman
rich enough to feed his madness.
~ BoOKwoRMs.
Not only here are books, but book
worms and book mummies and book
gophers and burrowers and searchers.
From one of the library galleries you may
gaze down upon them; down there in a
great pit seated at an immense star-like
system of long desks all radiating from
q common center. Not a word is
spoken. All poring over books, and 81
lent attendants in creakless shoes bring
ing them more books. Mostly pale,
sallow, lean and middle or prematurely
aged men, their brains thatched with
lifeless wigs, their eyes glaring into
books through staring spectacles, clothes
black and seedy and hanging in wrinkles
about their spare anatomies. Such are
some of the male mummies who pass.
their days cramming from books at the
British Museum library; cramming, per
chance, for some well-to-do writer;
cramming for points he may wish to
use in novel, essay or work philosophi-
cal, theological, Biographical or histor-
ioaf; cramming for a few shillings per
day, just enough to buy food at the six
pence chop-house to hold body together
while their minds cram; going down
Ike old buckets into these wells of
knowledge and coming up full and pour
ing into some other mans reservoir,
and so going down and coming up un-
I'll the hoops burst, the slaves tumble in
and their weary souls fly out of the
wells mouth and out of the British Mu-
scum library. For certainly such q life
kills them off; dries their flesh to leath-
or as they breathe this atmosphere of
old books, old leather, old parchment,
old paper and old musty ideas.
: Here, also, in this great and silent
reading-room, is the British female
mummy, q living cadayer or literary
ghoul. feeding on tones; working for
scanty bread by digging up long writ
ten nonsense or lies, or strings of words
49, LII -.