, 1888-09-25
CARELESS HANDLING.
SOME OF THE TRIALS TO WHICH
BOOKSELLERS ARE SUBJECTED.


Wares Ruined by the Customer Who Ex-
amines but Does Not Buy-women More
Careless Than DIen-Damage Done on n
Rainy Day.
Hardly anything else offered at the stores
is SO delicate as fine books, or shows SO
quickly the effects of a careless hand. 1t
may be, but rarely is, the hand of a true
book lover, who has an appreciation of the
substance but little feeling for the form. He
should choose the second hand book stores as
the field of his eNertions, of the libraries" of
the cheap publishers. More often, it must be
confessed, it is a feminine touch which
rumples the thick leaves, blurs the engray-
ings, or cracks open the back. If there's no
help for it, why won't the dear creatures
confine their caresses to the elegantly bound
checker boards, with History of England"
on the back, or the elaborate plush and gold
prayer books that won't openl Then the
bookseller would be left in a far more spiri-
tual frame of mind, and the ladies would be
just as well off.
All this, of course, Isl on the superstition
that it is the booksellers books that are sub
Jected to hard usage; if they are ones personal
property, he may abuse them with impunity
and no one may object, save on general
principles-one can't forever stand on the
formality of first acquaintance, says An
drew Lang in "a recent Fortnightly Review.
HELD OVER THE FIRE.
81 remember, before the publication of q
novel now celebrated, seeing a privately
printed vellum bound copy of it on large pa
per in the hands of a literary lady. She.was
holding it over the fire, and had already
made the vellum covers curl wide open like
the shells Of an afflicted oyster. 1T is u book
which a poor man hn written she ex-
planned, and he's had it printed TO see
whether some one won't be kind enough to
publish it l ventured, perhaps pedan-
tically, to point out that the poor man could
not be so very poor or he would not have
made so costly an experiment on Dutch pa
per. But the lady said she did not know
how that might be, and she went ON t~oasting
the experiment. IL all this there is a fine
contempt for everything but the spiritual as
pect OF literature: there is an aversion to the
mere coquctry and display Of morocco and
rcd letters, and tie toys which arause the
minds of men,"
A certain boob seller who is noted for his
courtesy observes that there IS no conpari-
son between the way men treat his books and
the way Of the women. Few men, compare
lively, examine his stock, and for the most
part they are men who know. That the men
cEtANNA1At ~ Va AAo bOOhos SLllt lLt
women depreciate it, was his little mot.
While such a woman as Andrew Lang de
scribes q ay be found now and then, her
cas- is small. Duo who can number the host
Of women who loCE on books in the light of
household furnishings, and adopt the same
mea2s Of asccrtaining their value that they
would in ccaE4iEing six draperies? From
sacl a stand point, asked to guess the value
C. a fine book, She Is uo-ally sure to estimate
IL not more than half.
on a RAINY DAY.
Our friend the bcc.;sellcr said thai about q
year ago he received over n hund-ed fine
heliotypes from a Boston publisher, which he
exposed for sale. AL day they stood there,
the admiration of nearly every woman that
entered his store, and at night they looked
very little like the beautiful prints of a few
hours before. They we're crumpled and
soiled, and one or two were torn, and, that
nothing might be lacking to complete their
ruin, each had mysterious, small purple
stains all along the margins. The day had
been rainy, and these tell tale marks were
the prints Of the wet, black KID gloves of his
customers. He says also that it is not I'M
common for women to come into his store
out Of q snow storm, lay down their wet
muffs and umbrellas on his beautiful and
costly books, where a few seconds are sufi-
cient to take dollars out Of their value, and
sweetly turn their attention to something
else. At such times the poor bookseller hur-
ries to the rescue with fear and trembling
lest he shall displease his customer, and as
politely as possible removes the wet articles
from his books.
what do you do" he was asked, "when
your customers succeed in spelling q fine
bookl Do you call their attention to the
fact and tell them you expect them to maxi
good the lossG" Never" he replied, as Il
shocked at the suggestion. ''They would
never come into my store again. They very
rarely notice the damage they have done,
and if, as the extreme of good breeding, they
offered an apology, we have to tell them it's
all right. When they go away We remove
the book; it can never be sold except as sec
ond hand" What Spartan self restraint
How any ordinary man would scream in
agony: Dear madam, don't you see what
you have done7 Look at thatl' and as the
wise man said, she would undoubtedly
s~traightway gather up her damp mittens and
damper muff and wet umbrella, and the
whole catalogue of her soppy bundles, and
march out in high dudSeon, never to returnl
He is right. 1t would never do~.-Springaeld
Republican.