Connecticut western news., 1910-04-28
INTEREST GROWING IN LIBRARY MATTER
"A READER" WRITES A LETTER
And Expresses Decided Disapproyal of Plan Under Consideration-Another Correspondent InjeCts a Little Sar- casm Into the Discussion.

Correspondent InjeCts Little Sar-
 casm Into the Discussion. EDITOR NEWS:
 We are deeply interested in the Ca naan library question. Being old resi- dents and taxpayers and expecting to spend our lives In the good old town of Canaan, it is but natural that we should take an interest in all things concerning the welfare of the town.
 The practical side of the question con- cerning the library has been considered for and against, by people more able than we, but there is nearly always a bit of sentiment to be found mixing with the practical if we but look for it. Sensibility. that acuteness of perception, that dellcacy of feeling which charac- terizes the refined and intelligent nature, seems to be something that we must keep in abeyance or ont of sight to make way for the hard and the practical. We all know the self-approYed self-satisf1ed way Ill which many women will say, "You see I am very practical, ," as if it was quite out of date to have ideals or sentiment of any sort.
 We all know that it takes money to be born, to be married, to die. and to run town. Elch family wants to be able to pay its own birth, marriage and death bill, but also each self-res oecting taxpayer wants to be considered part and parcel of the town i'll which he lives There is always sure to be the pr teUicsl side to him and if you are we'll enougir acquainted with him you will un loabt- edly find he has ideals. Let Us look at the practical side of the library question from our point of view; we will indulge in sentiment later. .-..
 When a man Is head over heels in debt we consider it very reprehensible conduct in the wife If she keeps plung- ing him further and further in, seeming to care nothing at all whether he ever pays his debts or not. Is it not just as bad for a few towuspeople to try to keep on adding more and more expenses to an already debt-laden town? Haven't we all feeling of pride in the honor of our town? We can't have everything we want. We must give our town chance. to get on her feet. Meanwhile we want no makeshift library. Nothing we could possibly do would be ill the end so unsatisfactory as this proposed plan of turning the Lime Company office in to public library. The outside of the building suggests shop, office. in man. ner distressing to anyone who has any notion of how library should look from the outside.
 Now let us talk sentiment. We see before us a long. rather low building of artistic, we might say scholastic, outline, built on site worthy of such a digni- fled structure, the land given to the town by generous toWnswoman whose sweet and gracious presence is removed from among us. There is room on this piece of land for every improvement that the townspeople for generations to come might want to make, either in the building itself or on the grounds.
 A public library should be more than its hall, more perhaps than even its churches, an exponent of the to'wnspeo- ple's taste, culture, character, ideals. It should not be off at one side suggesting either the privileged few or what is even worse a wretched makeshift. We see that ideal take shape; we see some time, perhaps, portrait of the giyer of the land for the library in one of It's beauti- flu rooms. Do we not all know that such tender and gracious things lend distinc- tion and a wonderful beauty to our pub lie buildings in any city or town? The most beautiful rooms ill many museums and public buildings are those which contain the portraits of those who have given few or many things from their store of beauty, and to give land is to give of the best one has.
 We are lovers of old families. Being nobody in particular ourselves, we are yet far from being worshippers of aris- tocracy, but we do believe that the old families with generations of birth, breed ing, culture and refinement back of them can never be replaced by the new conner no matter how fine he too may be and also welcome. But the aged of the old families, they who are going from us, never to come back, let us honor thelr gifts or their willingness to give. One such, who to-day is laid to rest, wanted to give us land on which to build a library. She loved the land yet she wanted to give it for the public good. Land of her fathers it was, and and we could have taken it and builded 8 library when the town was out of