COMMUTER'S WIFE n 



but to smuggle in the clumsy bulk of Gerarde's 

 " Herball " in its snuffy sheep cover was an impos- 

 sibility, and father had to suffer from weak muddy 

 coffee for a fortnight. Good coffee was one of his 

 few luxuries, and Aunt Lot knew well how to make 

 her mild wrath felt. Exactly why she grudged 

 father his precious old books I never could discover, 

 possibly because she could not imagine any other 

 point of view than her own, which narrowness she 

 called economy. I very early found, however, that 

 we were not the only buyers obliged to retrieve. 

 Men came to that auction room whose word was law 

 to hundreds of their fellows, and packed away their 

 winnings in mysterious pockets like so many crimes, 

 and I once helped an old thumb-fingered gentleman, 

 who owned a railroad, to stow away a glorious mis- 

 sal illuminated on vellum in a pasteboard box marked 

 " one ream legal cap ! " 



Since then as a married woman I have mingled 

 with others of my class, and I find that this stupid 

 book grudge among us is a more fatal disease than 

 the book madness of men, and I only hope that some 

 one will discover the bacillus that causes it. I also 

 often wondered why father cared about Aunt Lot's 

 protestations ; such money as he had was his own to 

 spend, but it was doubtless owing to his medical rule 



