t do you think of that?" And
_that_ was without question a very large and ornate and costly mahogany
bookcase with glass doors. Before I saw the doors I had no doubt about
my host, but they were a seal upon my faith, for although a bookman is
obliged to have one bit of glass in his garden for certain rare plants
from Russia and Morocco, to say nothing of the gold and white vellum lily
upon which the air must not be allowed to blow, especially when charged
with gas and rich in dust, yet he hates this conservatory, just as much
as he loves its contents. His contentment is to have the flowers laid
out in open beds, where he can pluck a blossom at will. As often as one
sees the books behind doors, and most of all when the doors are locked,
then he knows that the owner is not their lover, who keeps tryst with
them in the evening hours when the work of the day is done, but their
jailer, who has bought them in the market-place for gold, and holds them
in this foreign place by force. It has seemed to me as if certain old
friends looked out from their prison with appealing glance, and one has
been tempted to break the glass and let, for instance, Elia go free. It
would be like the emancipation of a slave. Elia was not, good luck for
him, within this particular prison, and I was brought back from every
temptation to break the laws of property by my chairman, who was still
pursuing his catechism. "What," was question two, "do you think I paid
for _that_?" It was a hopeless catechism, for I had never possessed
anything like _that_, and none of my friends had in their homes anything
like _that_, and in my wildest moments I had never asked the price of
such a thing as _that_. As it loomed up before me in its speckless
respectability and insolence of solid wealth my English sense of
reverence for money awoke, and I confessed that this matter was too high
for me; but even then, casting a glance of deprecation in its direction,
I noticed _that_ was almost filled by a single work, and I wondered what
it could be. "Cost 80 pounds if it cost a penny, and I bought it second-
hand in perfect condition for 17 pounds, 5s., with the books thrown
in--_All the Year Round_ from the beginning in half calf;" and then we
returned in procession to the drawing-room, where my patron apologised
for our absence, and explained that when two bookmen got together over
books it was difficult to tear them away. He was an admirable chairman,
for he occ