The daily morning journal and courier., 1895-01-05
THE FLEEIJNG SHOW.
Some Of 1ts Facts nnd Eaneles.
Written for the oURNAL AND CouRIER.l
 A BORROWED BOOK.

1 BORROWED bOOtAs
 The following suggestion was recent
 ly made in an English journal; "lf
 ever a new religion is able to impose
 new festivals and fast days on the hu-
 man race, it is to be hoped that a
 solemn week of returning books to their
 owners will every year precede a Feast
 of Property"
 | Such a week of atonement would
 bring consolation to tens of thousands of bereaved and Respondent book
 owners, and set in motion, for the time being, a circulating library of almost
 innumerable volumes. It seems churl-
 ish to refuse the loan of book, but 1t
 is often with serious regret that one
 gives the treasure into the doubtful
 care of another Will 1t ever be re-
 turned? In what condition will it come?
 Dog-eared, broken-baclSed and thumb
 marked? With marginal notes, ir-
 relevant to the subject, scrawled by
 childish hands? These thoughts flash
 through the mind of the lender, as the
 borrower walks blithely away with one
 or more volumes. He looks gravely at
 the vacant spaces left on the shelves,
 and wishes he had had the courage to
 refuse. If he is wise, he will at ance
 place in these vacant spaces slip of
 paper bearing the name of the borrow
 CT and the date of the loan; then he
 will have the slight satisfaction of
 knowing who has books and how long they have been kept If one dares, he could not do better than to put up on his
 bookcase or over his library door, the
 text selected as motto by a famous book-collector in Paris He could re- fuse to loan book even to the dearest of friends, with unrelenting sternness, but to prevent requests, as far as pos sible, he had this motto placed where all could read: "Go ye rather to them that sell, and buy for yourselves"
 In olden time. when books were few, and very costly, there was little bor- rowing. Those intended for general use were chained and locked securely to the tables upon which they were to be read. It is said that in the thirteenth cen tury books were so scarce that when a religious council was assembled, and wished to consult certain works of the Fathers, responsible messengers were often sent long distance to borrow them, heavy security being given for their safe return. At this date, the cheapness of books and the large num- Der of public libraries and circulating libraries, have lessened the demand for loans from those who are in posses sion of small or larger collections of books, and the book lovers grievances, especially in cities, are mercifully few.
 Even at the beginning of this cen tury books were expensive luxuries There is true story of a borrowed book, that never failed to harrow the | hearers as well as the reciter. It may have been in 1877 that a little school | girl delghtedly announced that "the l master" had said she might take up | the study of arithmetic. The tldings | were received with much pleasure. turned to dismay when 1t was found | that the family "Dabolr' had dlsap- peared. Borrowed, probably, and lost) The child was an orphan; the grand were rich in all else but money, and great depression succeeded her elation. But young uncle nobly came to the rescue walked several miles to ! bookstore and paid for a brand new, Daboll's Arithmetic out of his own earnings. When he return Ad with the prize the child's delipht wa e most too intense. Gan you understand his, children of to-day, with your store )f beautifully bound and illustrated oooks--all this rapture over an arith- netic? She sat by the fireside after supper. and hugged the book, and 1eeped into it's pages, and was thrilled with gratitude and pride and ambi- ion. Then the schoolmaster came in. Ie caught sight of the book and his yes shone with covetousness. He .sked to take it, and the child gave it ID, politely, as she had been taught. 'ut unwillingly. It was a new edition nd the schoolmaster seemed fascinat- d. He bent forward to study it by the relight, and stopped nearer and nearer he flames. The little girl, distressed, z ut not daring to object, or to ask for it ' ack again, saw the beautiful, smooth I overs of new leather curving and curl q ng in the heat. Bedtime came and she f hoping to take the abused f with her, but still the school s master clutched it., lost to everything | ut the pleasure of new problems. Too F