Art and Science 



to yield or give ; it must not be too trouble- 

 some to carry backwards and forwards ; and it 

 must live on shelf C, D, or E, so that there 

 need be no stooping or reaching too high. 

 These are the conditions which a really good 

 book must fulfil ; simple, however, as they are, 

 it is surprising how few volumes comply with 

 them satisfactorily; moreover, being perhaps 

 too sensitively conscientious, I allowed another 

 consideration to influence me, and was sincerely 

 anxious not to take a book which would be in 

 constant use for reference by readers, more 

 especially as, if I did this, I might find myself 

 disturbed by the officials. 



For weeks I made experiments upon sundry 

 poetical and philosophical works, whose names 

 I have forgotten, but could not succeed in 

 finding my ideal desk, until at length, more by 

 luck than cunning, I happened to light upon 

 Frost's u Lives of Eminent Christians," which 

 I had no sooner tried than I discovered it to 

 be the very perfection and ne plus ultra of 

 everything that a book should be. It lived 

 in Case No. 2008, and I accordingly took 



at once to sitting in Row B, where for 



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