Confessions of a book-lover

by E. Walter Walters

NOW let another occupy the printed page. I have promised to give the experiences of other book-lovers, to show how books influence their thoughts and ways; and I am anxious to introduce a short, slim gentleman of sixty odd summers, with a smiling face and an air of wellbeing, a retiring, peaceful book-lover, whom you would never suspect of playing any part in a mystery.

Nevertheless, my friend must plead guilty to practising the ‘art of make-believe’ to such a degree that one could never be certain how much was real concerning him and his affairs and how much was imaginary. Indeed, the only sure and unchanging thing about him was his spectacles and the manner in which he viewed life through them—his point of view.

‘My spectacles,’ he told me, over and over again, ‘are rose-coloured. You understand, rose-coloured. They and myself are inseparable. Without them I am as bad as stone-blind, and dare not take a step in any direction.’

Then he would smile in a manner that led one to suspect that he was merely drawing upon his imagination. But I learnt that my friend’s life had been lived under such peculiar difficulties, and that he had passed through so much sorrow and affliction, that without his rose-coloured spectacles he was, in one sense, stone-blind.

It pleased him to imagine that the lenses in his treasured spectacles, which were gold-rimmed and old-fashioned in shape, had been cut from rose-coloured pebbles, with the power of giving a rosy hue to life, and bringing all things into correct perspective.

‘Correct perspective and the right point of view,’ he remarked on a certain day, ‘are everything in life. My spectacles give me the correct vision. They bring men and affairs into proper focus, and, what is more, they give them a rose tint. Robert Louis Stevenson wore spectacles something like mine, but his were far and away more powerful. They enabled him to see farther and more clearly. They were of a deeper and purer tint.’

He drew from his pocket a small cloth-bound edition of passages from Stevenson’s works. The little volume did not measure more than, say, three by five inches, and was considerably soiled and worn; but he handled it as though it were worth its weight in precious stones.

It was clear, before he opened the volume, that he knew the greater part of the contents by heart; for he commenced to quote as he ran his fingers round the edge of the cover:

‘“When you have read, you carry away with you a memory of the man himself; it is as though you had touched a loyal hand, looked into brave eyes, and made a noble friend; there is another bond on you thenceforward, binding you to life and to the love of virtue.”’

He accompanied the quotation with a pleasing smile, as who should say, ‘How true that is and how nobly expressed!’ Then he turned the leaves hastily as though looking for a favourite passage; but he abandoned the search a moment later, and glanced up.