who "greased and dogs-eared such volumes as were confided to his tender mercies, with the same indifference wherewith he singed his own wigs." But there is a race of mortals more annoying to a conscientious man than borrowers. These are the spontaneous lenders, who insist that you shall borrow their tomes. For my own part, when I am oppressed with the charity of such, I lock their books up in a drawer, and behold them not again till the day of their return. There is no security against borrowers, unless a man like Guibert de Pixérécourt steadfastly refuses to lend. The device of Pixérécourt was un livre est un ami qui ne change jamais. But he knew that our books change when they have been borrowed, like our friends when they have been married; when "a lady borrows them," as the fairy queen says in the ballad of "Tamlane."
"But had I kenn'd, Tamlane," she says,
"A lady wad borrowed thee,
I wad ta'en out thy twa gray een,
Put in twa een o' tree!
"Had I but kenn'd, Tamlane," she says,
"Before ye came frae hame,
I wad ta'en out your heart o' flesh,
Put in a heart o' stane!"
Above the lintel of his library door, Pixérécourt had this couplet carved—
