June 1.
These were purchased with the hardly earned savings of a thrifty Seat and show the serious trend of his mind the premiers was as little to be dreamed of A writer in it home paper has hal access to the library of Mr. Ramsty MacDonald and writes interesting article on its con: tents, It ix a somewhat indd cate" matter to scrutinize man's—bookshelves. For binds of a feather flock toxeth wut aman is known by the friends he associates with, so is he known by. the books he buys and reads, The shelves of his bookcase may be an unreliable guide for we have heard of rie men who furnished _theiy tis braves. ax they furnished the other rooms in their houses, vy xiving an order to a wholesale bookseller and paying for th book furnished at so much per Tinear toot of space occupied. Such a library is also a tell-tale guide to the mental calibre of its owner, He, at least, homage to popular opinion so) 3 far as to recognize that a ho without books is not furnished Dut beyond that there ix no ication of his tastes. Not the bright new folios in their ors: covers but the well thumbed and dingy volume tells us what kind of aman the reader is, We would be willing to maintain the thesis that a single such book, even were it but a well would give on of the owner's as a post in the hierarchy of heaven, But when these hooks were purchased Mr. MacDonald was already a budding, if not a rising, politician. He was tributing articles to the press and these were the tools of his trade, He may have loved them or he may have disliked then, but he needs must become fa: millar with their contents and he able to handle them dottly or he would be forever a me-craftsman at his chess the lighter literature: us, Scott, the Bronte. ge Eliot and "a wonderful collection of Scottish tales of the seventeenth century." These, we may take if, are Mr. Muc-Donald's true loves, Me purchased some of then when he wus earning 12s, Gd. a weeic doubtless, often scrimped stomach to feed his Every every Colt i: dreamer of dreams and a seer of visions.
He may dwell in:®shoiling on a heather ill, but his soul wanders through king's palaces and goes a roving with lords and ladies in the moonlight. From Dickens "Mr. MacDonald would drink in the deep symtpathy of that writer for the poor and frioniess, Scott's per character than " lengthy ay quaintance of a week or more There is a story of an Oxford graduate who wus travelling ov the top of " bus with a fresh-min and, to impress his new nil with his learning, quoted n the original, from the rament, An old gentle silting behind him, tapped him on the shoulder and, thrust ing a Greek New Testament into his hand, asked him it he would Kindly find there the quotation he had just made, The startled youth recovered his poise and suid airily "Oh, t beg your par don, the quotation from Aeschylus. [had forgot ten." "Ah, indeed," said the old Torey and, diving' into. another Vocket, produced a miniature Aeschylus, "would you min finding it" her For God's sake," said the horrified student to his companion, "Let us leave the bus, This fellow carries the love of his na ever burns fiercely the heart of a mountaineer. The pa why stories of Scottish life in the seventeenth century are springs of couthy humour whi leave no sting in the reader' mint. Altogether it ix an al-mirable library. There may be nothing very profound 0: ab-but there is much to iwalry one humani-tananism la the mind of a vext and a good man can hardly
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.