IV_.
What boys CAN do may be gathered from the following true story,
sent me by a correspondent who was the immediate sufferer:--
One summer day he met in town an acquaintance who for many years had
been abroad; and finding his appetite for old books as keen as ever,
invited him home to have a mental feed upon "fifteeners" and other
bibliographical dainties, preliminary to the coarser pleasures enjoyed
at the dinner-table. The "home" was an old mansion in the outskirts
of London, whose very architecture was suggestive of black-letter
and sheep-skin. The weather, alas! was rainy, and, as they
approached the house, loud peals of laughter reached their ears.
The children were keeping a birthday with a few young friends.
The damp forbad all outdoor play, and, having been left too
much to their own devices, they had invaded the library.
It was just after the Battle of Balaclava, and the heroism of
the combatants on that hard-fought field was in everybody's mouth.
So the mischievous young imps divided themselves into two opposing camps--
Britons and Russians. The Russian division was just inside the door,
behind ramparts formed of old folios and quartos taken from
the bottom shelves and piled to the height of about four feet.
It was a wall of old fathers, fifteenth century chronicles,
county histories, Chaucer, Lydgate, and such like.
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