ecting of
heterogeneous books. If bibliographical knowledge be our aim, their very
diversity tends to confuse us. If recreation be our object, better far to
join a circulating library than garner volumes which, once read, are
never to be opened again. Learning and study cannot be intended, for the
formation of a library of nondescript books collected upon no system or
plan can, at best, endow us with but a smattering of knowledge.

There was once a certain bishop who used continually to collect useless
luxuries. The Emperor Charlemagne, perceiving this, ordered a merchant
who traded in rare and costly objects to paint a common mouse with
different colours and to offer it to the bishop, as being a rare and
curious animal which he had just brought from Palestine. The bishop is
transported with delight at the sight of it, and immediately offers the
merchant three silver pounds for such a treasure. But the merchant,
acting on his instructions, bargains with the bishop, saying that he
would rather throw it into the sea than sell it for so little. Finally
the bishop offers twenty pounds for it. The merchant, wrapping up the
'ridiculus mus' in precious silk, is going away when the collector,
unable to bear the thought of losing so great a curio, calls him back and
says that he will give him a bushel of silver for it. This the merchant
accepts: the money is paid; and the merchant returns to the Emperor to
give him an account of the transaction.

Then Charlemagne convokes the bishops and priests of all the province,
and placing before them the money which the mouse has fetched, reads them
a homely lesson on the foolishness of collecting profitless trifles.
Sternly he enjoins them in future to use their money in administering to
the wants of the poor rather than to throw it away on such unprofitable
baubles as a painted mouse. The guilty bishop, now become the
laughing-stock of the province, is permitted to depart without
punishment.

Doubtless the great majority of book-collectors are not specialists. They
may set greater store by a certain class of works which appeals to them
from some whimsical reason, but until they have grown middle-aged in
their pursuit most of them are but _dilettanti_.

'Yes,' I can hear you exclaim, 'but if your collecting propensities are
to be curbed and countless books passed by, books which your very
instinct urges you to acquire, surely you will lose most of the charm of
collecting? How dull to