Dr. W.P. Lawrence, head of the department of English Literature, having for some time been engaged in the task of selecting books for the new library, writes very interestingly of his impressions, as follows:
Ever since I read, some years ago, Dean Swift’s delightful book bearing the title, “The Battle of the Books,” in which volume he most delightfully endows books on the shelves of a library with human faculties,--I say, ever since first reading that volume, the rows on rows of books in the library have assumed a livelier interest for me. Books now standing on library shelves are to me when I come into their presence with uncovered head and silent foot-fall, as so many citizens of more or less intellectual renown gravely looking at me and deftly beckoning me to join them in converse. And some books are highly entertaining and instructive talkers, while now and then you will find one that is an insufferable bore,--or, perhaps, it may possess such morphic charm as to put you to sleep before you have waded through a dozen lines.
With this feeling about books, it was my pleasure recently to visit some of our large American cities to select an installment of books for the Elon Library. I was to see first, books of general reference, and secondly, general literature and the more technical books for the various departments. There were to be bought dictionaries in the various languages from Greek to Spanish, and encyclopedias, and an infinite variety of complete technical treatises. Books were to be found on the English language and literature, the German, the Greek, the Latin, the French and the Spanish languages. Books were wanted on fiction, on history, on biography, books of travel, of essays, of letters, of sermons, of Biblical treatises, Biblical commentaries, books on sociology, education, and a variety of other subjects that would make the list too long for this place. But it may interest some to add that many books were found on geology, zoology, mineralogy, botany, biology, music, the useful arts, domestic science, and commercial art.
Of all the book stores visited, the Leary Book Store at Philadelphia was the largest and most interesting. This store carries a stock of 300,000 volumes in all languages and on all subjects. It is recognized as the greatest second-hand book store in the United States. While it claims to be a second-hand book store, yet it sells tens of thousands of volumes of new books and of books slightly shelf-worn. For instance, I bought or the Elon Library as set of Warner’s Library of the World’s Best Literature, 45 volumes, gilt top, rough edge, good buckram binding, for $27, and a set of the Century Dictionary, 12 volumes, half leather binding, for $20, whereas the set burned when our library burned cost $90.
But it was not all delight while in Philadelphia. The whole city awoke August 3 to a day of sorrow and mourning. Warren G. Harding, President of the United States, had suddenly, and unexpectedly died at San Francisco, California, the evening before (about 11:30 p.m., Philadelphia time). Everywhere one turned out as soon as the morning papers were out there was the flag of the nation at half mast.
Perhaps President Harding was not more beloved by any city of the great country he presided over than by the two million people that make up the population of Philadelphia. It is the custom of the great Wanamaker store, where 3,000 people are employed daily, even through the heated summer season, to close the day’s work with a 15-minute concert by some noted musician on the massive organ that fills the vast store with melody. But on the afternoon following the president’s death the tongue of the great instrument was silent. I happened to be present and saw the thousands of salesmen march solemnly into the sad sunlight of the great city and melt away in the throngs of humanity to find their various abodes for the night. It is a sad hour when a nation is called on to mourn the death of a sane and safe chief.
But there was a gleam of hope and calm confidence as the sorrowing mind realized that Vice-President Coolidge, perhaps an abler man than the good predecessor then pale in death, had taken the oath of office in the early hours of the morning and that between the hours of sunset and dawn one President had died and another had stepped in to fill the gap in the line of the rulers of the earth. Death younger in California had set up a commotion in a quiet Coolidge farm house in New England. That Friday evening about the hour of 9, we were forced to take a siding between Baltimore and Washington to give way for a special train hurrying the new President to Washington. It passed at such high speed that one of our passengers remarked, “It takes two to SEE that train.” Only about once in a generation of 20 years are we called on to mourn the death of a President in office, and to experience the consequent rearrangement of the personnel in high governmental positions. But life is made up of a checker-work, in both public and private experiences, of alternate joys and sorrow. So may we submit willingly to an overruling Providence that is both benevolent and wise.
May book hut had other interesting experiences to come into but they are not permitted to be recounted here for lack of space. It is to be hoped, however, that the hundreds of volumes purchased will ere long be able to greet Elon students from the shelves of a new and handsome library building.
From the Maroon and Gold, Elon College, N.C., Aug. 15, 1923
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