The Guide to Reading Part 2

The daily selections can in most cases be read in from fifteen minutes to half an hour, and Dr. Eliot, President Emeritus of Harvard, has said that fifteen minutes a day devoted to good literature will give every man the essentials of a liberal education. If time can be found between breakfast and the work-hours for these few minutes of reading, one will receive more benefit than if it is done during the somnolent period which follows the day's work and dinner. It is a mistake, however, to read before breakfast. Eyes and stomach are too closely related to permit of this.

Happy is he who can read these books in company with a sympathetic companion. His enjoyment of the treasure they contain will be doubled.

One final hint--when reading for something besides pastime, get in the habit of referring when necessary to dictionary, encyclopaedia, and atlas. If on the subway or a railway train, jot down a memorandum of the query on the flyleaf, and look up the answer at the first opportunity.

ASA DON d.i.c.kINSON.

There is no business, no avocation whatever, which will not permit a man, who has the inclination, to give a little time, every day, to study.

--DANIEL WYTTENBACH.

JANUARY 1ST TO 7TH

1st. I. Franklin's Rules of Conduct, 6-Pt. II: 86-101 II. Longfellow's Psalm of Life, 14:247-248 III. Bryant's Thanatopsis, 15:18-20 IV. Lowell's To the Future, 13:164-167

2nd. I. Arnold's Self Dependence, 14:273-274 II. Adams's Cold Wave of 32 B. C., 9-Pt. I:146 III. Thomas's Frost To-night, 12:343

3rd. TOMa.s.sO SALVINI, b. 1 Ja. 1829; d. 1 Ja. 1916 I. Toma.s.so Salvini, 17-II:80-108

4th. I. Extracts from Thackeray's Book of Sn.o.bs, 1-Pt. I:3-37

5th. I. Ruskin's Venice, 1-Pt. II:73-88 II. St. Marks, 1-Pt. II:91-100

6th. I. Shakespeare's Blow, Blow Thou Winter Wind, 12:256-257 II. Messenger's A Winter Wish, 12:259-261 III. Emerson's The Snow Storm, 14:93-94 IV. Thackeray's Nil Nisi Bonum, l-Pt. I:130-143

7th. I. Adams's Ballad of the Thoughtless Waiter, 9-Pt. I:147 II. Us Poets, 9-Pt. I:148 III. Spenser's Amoretti, 13:177

No book that will not improve by repeated readings deserves to be read at all.

--THOMAS CARLYLE.

JANUARY 8TH TO 14th

8th. I. Fred Trover's Little Iron-clad, 7-Pt. II:82-105

9th. I. Kipling's The Man Who Would Be King, 21-Pt. II:1-56

10th. I. Carlyle's Boswell's Life of Johnson, 2-Pt. I: 32-78

11th. I ALEXANDER HAMILTON, b. II Ja. 1757 Alexander Hamilton, 16-Pt. I:71-91

12th. I. Macaulay's Dr. Samuel Johnson, His Biographer, 2-Pt. II:30-39 II. The Puritans, 2-Pt. II:23-29

13th. I. EDMUND SPENSER, d, 16 Ja. 1599 Prothalamion, 13:13-20

14th. I. Hawthorne's Dr. Heidegger's Experiment, 3-Pt. I:3-19

The novel, in its best form, I regard as one of the most powerful engines of civilization ever invented.

--SIR JOHN HERSCHEL.

JANUARY 15TH TO 21ST

15th. EDWARD EVERETT, d. 15 Ja. 1865 I. Lincoln to Everett, 5-Pt. I:120 II. Irving's Westminster Abbey, 3-Pt. II:75-92

16th. GEORGE V. HOBART, b. 16 Ja. 1867 I. John Henry at the Races, 9-Pt. II:107-113 II. Poe's The Black Cat, 4-Pt. I:127-143

17th. BENJAMIN FRANKLIN, b. 17 Ja. 1706 I. Poor Richard's Almanac, 6-Pt. II:133-149 II. Maxims, 7-Pt. II:11 III. The Whistle, 6-Pt. II:156-159

18th. DANIEL WEBSTER, b. 18 Ja. 1782 I. Adams and Jefferson, 6-Pt. I:3-60

19th. EDGAR ALLAN POE, b. 19 Ja. 1809 I. Cask of Amontillado, 4-Pt. I:67-77 II. The Raven, 10:285-292 III. Edgar Allan Poe, 17-Pt. I:28-37

20th. N. P. WILLIS, b. 20 Ja. 1806 I. Miss Albina McLush, 7-Pt. I:25-29 RICHARD LE GALLIENNE, b. 20 Ja. 1866 II. May Is Building Her House, 12:328

21st. JAMES STUART, Earl of Murray, killed 21 Ja. 1570 I. The Bonny Earl of Murray, 10:21-22 II. Lincoln's The Dred Scott Decision, 5-Pt. I:13-22 III. Fragment on Slavery, 5-Pt. I:11-12

He that revels in a well-chosen library has innumerable dishes, and all of admirable flavour. His taste is rendered so acute as easily to distinguish the nicest shade of difference.

--WILLIAM G.o.dWIN.

JANUARY 22ND TO 28TH

22nd. LORD BYRON, b. 22 Ja. 1788 I. Macaulay's Lord Byron the Man, 2-Pt. II: 80-94 II. On This Day I Complete My Thirty-Sixth Year, 12:275-277 III. The Isles of Greece, 14:75-79

23rd. I. Lamb's Dream Children, 5-Pt. II:34-40 II. On Some of the Old Actors, 5-Pt. II:52-76

24th. I. Spenser's Epithalamium, 13:20-37

25th. ROBERT BURNS, b. 25 Ja. 1759 I. The Cotter's Sat.u.r.day Night, II:40-48 II. Robert Burns, 17-Pt. 1:43-64 II. Halleck's Burns, 15:67-73

26th. THOMAS LOVELL BEDDOES, d. 26 Ja. 1849 I. Wolfram's Dirge, 15:42-43 II. How Many Times Do I Love Thee, Dear? 12:158-159 III. Dream-Pedlary, 12:227-228 IV. Franklin's Philosophical Experiments, 6-Pt. II:125-130

27th. JOHN McCRAE, Died in France 28 Ja. 1918 I. In Flanders Fields, 15:214

28th. HENRY MORTON STANLEY, b. 28 Ja. 1841 I. Henry Morton Stanley, 17-Pt. II:97-124

We enter our studies, and enjoy a society which we alone can bring together. We raise no jealousy by conversing with one in preference to another; we give no offence to the most ill.u.s.trious by questioning him as long as we will, and leaving him as abruptly....

--WALTER SAVAGE LANDOR.

JANUARY 29TH TO FEBRUARY 4th