To return to the house, however. It is a capacious house enough, but not apparently very well built. The floors of the upper rooms shake under your tread; and I have heard, that when Southey had these rooms crowded and piled with books, there was a fear of their coming down. The house is one of those square houses of which you may count the rooms without going into them, but at each end is a circular projection, making each a snug sort of ladies' room. The room on the right hand as we entered, was said to be the sitting-room, and that on the left, the library, while the room over it was Southey's writing-room; and most of these rooms, as well as the entrance-hall, were all crowded with books. We were told that, after several days' sale at home, where some books as well as the furniture were sold, fourteen tuns of books and similar articles were sent off for sale in London. If Southey has not told us much about his haunts in the mountains, he has, however, particularly described that where his heart lay--his library. To this he has given a whole chapter in his Colloquies; and in this volume we must, as a matter of course, give a few extracts, for it is almost the only haunt of Southey, of which he has left us any glimpse in his writings. "I was in my library," he says, "making room upon the shelves for some books which had just arrived from New England, removing to a less conspicuous station others which were of less value, and in worn dress, when Sir Thomas entered. "'You are employed,' said he, 'to your heart's content. Why, Montesinos, with these books, and the delight you take in their constant society, what have you to covet or desire more?' "MONTESINOS.--'Nothing, ... except more books.' "SIR THOMAS MORE.--'_Crescit, indulgens sibi, dirus hydrops._' "MONTESINOS.--'Nay, nay, my ghostly monitor, this at least is no diseased desire! If I covet more, it is for the want I feel, and the use I should make of them. "Libraries," says my good old friend, George Dyer, a man as learned as he is benevolent, ... "libraries are the wardrobes of literature, whence men, properly informed, might bring forth something for ornament, much for curiosity, and more for use." These books of mine, as you well know, are not drawn up here for display, however much the pride of the eye may be gratified in beholding them; they are on actual service. Whenever they may be dispersed, there is not one among them that will ever be more comfortably lodged, or more highly prized by its possessor; and generations may pass away before some of them will again find a reader.... It is well that we do not moralize too much upon such subjects, ... "For foresight is a melancholy gift, Which bears the bald, and speeds the all-too swift." But the dispersion of a library, whether in retrospect or anticipation, is to me always a melancholy thing.'