“The booksellers who bought it, asked me to take it into my hospital. It wanted just a little, a very little patching. The copy in the museum is not to compare to it.” “You say it was not interesting?” “Not _very_ interesting, I said, sir.” “Why did you read so much of it, then?” “When a book is hard to come at, you are the more ready to read it when you have the chance.” “I suppose that's why one borrows his neighbour's books and don't read his own! I seldom take one down from those shelves.” Richard felt as if a wall was broken down between them. All the time they talked, old Simon stood beside, pleased to note how well his grandson could hold up the ball with the young squire, but saying nothing. If the matter had been hoof of horse, cow, or ass, he would not have been silent: he knew hoofs better than Richard knew books. Richard took down a small folio, the back of which looked much too soft and loose. Opening it, he found what he expected--a wreck. It was hardly fit to be called any more a book. The clothes had forsaken the body, or rather the body had decayed away from the clothes. “Now, look here!” he said. “Here is Cowley's Poems--in such a state that I doubt if anything would ever make a book of it again. I thought by the back all was wrong inside! See how the leaves have come away singly: the paper itself is rotten! I doubt if there is any way to make paper so far gone as this hold together. I know a good deal can be done, and I must learn what is known. I shan't be master of my trade till I know all that can be done now to stop such a book from crumbling into dust! Then I may find out something more!” “Well, for that one, I don't think it matters: Cowley ain't much!” said Lestrange, throwing the volume on a table. “I remember once taking down the book, and trying to read some of it: I could not; it's the dullest rubbish ever written.” “It's not so bad as that, sir!” answered Richard, and taking up the book he turned the leaves with light, practiced hand. “He was counted the greatest poet of his day, and no age loves dullness! Listen a moment, sir; I will read only one stanza.” He had found the “Hymn to the Light,” and read:-- “First born of _Chaos_, who so fair didst come From the old Negro's darksome womb! Which when it saw the lovely Child, The melancholy Mass put on kind looks and smil'd.” “I don't see much in that!” said Lestrange, as Richard closed the book, and glanced up expectant. Richard was silent for an instant. “At any rate,” he returned, “it is necessary to the understanding of our history, that we should know the kind of thing admired and called good at any given time of it: so our lecturer at King's used to tell us.” “At King's!” cried Lestrange.