In the city the confusion is wrought by the woman agent and the girl clerk. Next to resisting civilly the entreaties of the agent in black is for a man, after having threaded that modern labyrinth, the department store, and having halted at the book counter to take his bearings, to be pounced upon by the clerk in black before he has had time to thumb a single volume, and asked if he has been waited on. He watches the cosmopolitan stream of buyers tossing about the cosmopolitan collection of book bargains on the main aisle counter, and then retreats in confusion to seek some old-fashioned book store where he can loaf in ease and think of what he wants to buy. Though scarcely willing to admit the claim of many buyers and readers of books that it is not good book-buying etiquette to purchase a book at a department store, he feels at least that it is not a quiet, convenient, and wise way. And the pity of it all is, that out of this shuffle and clatter the child is made the victim of the poor book that is bought because it can be bought cheap. The fairly well arranged book store is the one place where a book for a boy may be bought in proper form. Though the second-hand book store is an interesting place for the man who has not the germ fear, it is no place to get a boy's book. And the old-fashioned book shop that must have been a joy to the man of reading tastes has passed, as has the old apothecary shop. From their modern offspring, the book store and the drug store, we must get our books and our physic. It is on the shelves of these book stores that buyers like to explore and make discoveries of editions. If the particular edition be known, a good way to buy is to order books directly by mail from the publisher. In fact, this is what often has to be done in small towns and in country districts where well-stocked shelves are not within reach. Yet few buyers can adjust themselves to the practice of buying anything that they have not seen. They like to feel the response of the book to the touch, see the type and the illustrations and the binding. This is all good where the store carries a complete stock; but if every good book wanted has to be ordered for the buyer, he might as well do it himself directly from the publisher. From these publishers good descriptive catalogues may be had for the asking, and by means of them the book not found at the store may be ordered.