The Love Affairs Of A Bibliomaniac [12]
evening with Judge Methuen and me, have waked up the next morning filled with the incurable enthusiasm of bibliomania. But the development of the passion is not always marked by exhibitions of violence; sometimes, like the measles, it is slow and obstinate about ``coming out,'' and in such cases applications should be resorted to for the purpose of diverting the malady from the vitals; otherwise serious results may ensue.
Indeed, my learned friend Dr. O'Rell has met with several cases (as he informs me) in which suppressed bibliomania has resulted fatally. Many of these cases have been reported in that excellent publication, the ``Journal of the American Medical Association,'' which periodical, by the way, is edited by ex-Surgeon-General Hamilton, a famous collector of the literature of ornament and dress.
To make short of a long story, the medical faculty is nearly a unit upon the proposition that wherever suppressed bibliomania is suspected immediate steps should be taken to bring out the disease. It is true that an Ohio physician, named Woodbury, has written much in defence of the theory that bibliomania can be aborted; but a very large majority of his profession are of the opinion that the actual malady must needs run a regular course, and they insist that the cases quoted as cured by Woodbury were not genuine, but were bastard or false phases, of the same class as the chickenpox and the German measles.
My mania exhibited itself first in an affectation for old books; it mattered not what the book itself was--so long as it bore an ancient date upon its title-page or in its colophon I pined to possess it. This was not only a vanity, but a very silly one. In a month's time I had got together a large number of these old tomes, many of them folios, and nearly all badly worm-eaten, and sadly shaken.
One day I entered a shop kept by a man named Stibbs, and asked if I could procure any volumes of sixteenth-century print.
``Yes,'' said Mr. Stibbs, ``we have a cellarful of them, and we sell them by the ton or by the cord.''
That very day I dispersed my hoard of antiques, retaining only my Prynne's ``Histrio- Mastix'' and my Opera Quinti Horatii Flacci (8vo, Aldus, Venetiis, 1501). And then I became interested in British balladry--a noble subject, for which I have always had a veneration and love, as the well-kept and profusely annotated volumes in cases 3, 6, and 9 in the front room are ready to prove to you at any time you choose to visit my quiet, pleasant home.
V
BALDNESS AND INTELLECTUALITY
One of Judge Methuen's pet theories is that the soul in the human body lies near the center of gravity; this is, I believe, one of the tenets of the Buddhist faith, and for a long time I eschewed it as one might shun a vile thing, for I feared lest I should become identified even remotely with any faith or sect other than Congregationalism.
Yet I noticed that in moments of fear or of joy or of the sense of any other emotion I invariably experienced a feeling of goneness in the pit of my stomach, as if, forsooth, the center of my physical system were also the center of my nervous and intellectual system, the point at which were focused all those devious lines of communication by means of which sensation is instantaneously transmitted from one part of the body to another.
I mentioned this circumstance to Judge Methuen, and it seemed to please him. ``My friend,'' said he, ``you have a particularly sensitive soul; I beg of you to exercise the greatest prudence in your treatment of it. It is the best type of the bibliomaniac soul, for the quickness of its apprehensions betokens that it is alert and keen and capable of instantaneous impressions and enthusiasms. What you have just told me convinces me that you are by nature qualified for rare exploits in the science and art of book-collecting. You will presently become bald--perhaps as bald as Thomas Hobbes was--for a vigilant and active soul invariably compels baldness, so close are the relations between the soul
Indeed, my learned friend Dr. O'Rell has met with several cases (as he informs me) in which suppressed bibliomania has resulted fatally. Many of these cases have been reported in that excellent publication, the ``Journal of the American Medical Association,'' which periodical, by the way, is edited by ex-Surgeon-General Hamilton, a famous collector of the literature of ornament and dress.
To make short of a long story, the medical faculty is nearly a unit upon the proposition that wherever suppressed bibliomania is suspected immediate steps should be taken to bring out the disease. It is true that an Ohio physician, named Woodbury, has written much in defence of the theory that bibliomania can be aborted; but a very large majority of his profession are of the opinion that the actual malady must needs run a regular course, and they insist that the cases quoted as cured by Woodbury were not genuine, but were bastard or false phases, of the same class as the chickenpox and the German measles.
My mania exhibited itself first in an affectation for old books; it mattered not what the book itself was--so long as it bore an ancient date upon its title-page or in its colophon I pined to possess it. This was not only a vanity, but a very silly one. In a month's time I had got together a large number of these old tomes, many of them folios, and nearly all badly worm-eaten, and sadly shaken.
One day I entered a shop kept by a man named Stibbs, and asked if I could procure any volumes of sixteenth-century print.
``Yes,'' said Mr. Stibbs, ``we have a cellarful of them, and we sell them by the ton or by the cord.''
That very day I dispersed my hoard of antiques, retaining only my Prynne's ``Histrio- Mastix'' and my Opera Quinti Horatii Flacci (8vo, Aldus, Venetiis, 1501). And then I became interested in British balladry--a noble subject, for which I have always had a veneration and love, as the well-kept and profusely annotated volumes in cases 3, 6, and 9 in the front room are ready to prove to you at any time you choose to visit my quiet, pleasant home.
V
BALDNESS AND INTELLECTUALITY
One of Judge Methuen's pet theories is that the soul in the human body lies near the center of gravity; this is, I believe, one of the tenets of the Buddhist faith, and for a long time I eschewed it as one might shun a vile thing, for I feared lest I should become identified even remotely with any faith or sect other than Congregationalism.
Yet I noticed that in moments of fear or of joy or of the sense of any other emotion I invariably experienced a feeling of goneness in the pit of my stomach, as if, forsooth, the center of my physical system were also the center of my nervous and intellectual system, the point at which were focused all those devious lines of communication by means of which sensation is instantaneously transmitted from one part of the body to another.
I mentioned this circumstance to Judge Methuen, and it seemed to please him. ``My friend,'' said he, ``you have a particularly sensitive soul; I beg of you to exercise the greatest prudence in your treatment of it. It is the best type of the bibliomaniac soul, for the quickness of its apprehensions betokens that it is alert and keen and capable of instantaneous impressions and enthusiasms. What you have just told me convinces me that you are by nature qualified for rare exploits in the science and art of book-collecting. You will presently become bald--perhaps as bald as Thomas Hobbes was--for a vigilant and active soul invariably compels baldness, so close are the relations between the soul