the wisdom of Solomon (who, by the way, was not
without his little experiences of the tender passion).

The janitor in the little glass box by the entrance to the library
inspected us and passed us on, with a silent benediction, to the lobby,
whence (when I had handed my stick to a bald-headed demigod and received
a talismanic disc in exchange) we entered the enormous rotunda of the
reading-room.

I have often thought that, if some lethal vapour of highly preservative
properties--such as formaldehyde, for instance--could be shed into the
atmosphere of this apartment, the entire and complete collection of
books and bookworms would be well worth preserving, for the
enlightenment of posterity, as a sort of anthropological appendix to the
main collection of the Museum. For, surely, nowhere else in the world
are so many strange and abnormal human beings gathered together in one
place. And a curious question that must have occurred to many observers
is: Whence do these singular creatures come, and whither do they go when
the very distinct-faced clock (adjusted to literary eye-sight) proclaims
closing time? The tragic-faced gentleman, for instance, with the
corkscrew ringlets that bob up and down like spiral springs as he walks?
Or the short, elderly gentleman in the black cassock and bowler hat, who
shatters your nerves by turning suddenly and revealing himself as a
middle-aged woman? Whither do they go? One never sees them elsewhere. Do
they steal away at closing time into the depths of the Museum and hide
themselves until morning in sarcophagi or mummy cases? Or do they creep
through spaces in the book-shelves and spend the night behind the
volumes in a congenial atmosphere of leather and antique paper? Who can
say? What I do know is that when Ruth Bellingham entered the
reading-room she appeared in comparison with these like a creature of
another order; even as the head of Antinous, which formerly stood (it
has since been moved) amidst the portrait-busts of the Roman Emperors,
seemed like the head of a god set in a portrait gallery of illustrious
baboons.

"What have we got to do?" I asked when we had found a vacant seat. "Do
you want to look up the catalogue?"

"No, I have the tickets in my bag. The books are waiting in the 'kept
books' department."

I placed my hat on the leather-covered shelf, dropped her gloves into
it--how delightfully intimate and companionable it seemed!--altered the
numbers on the tickets, a