Page:The haunted bookshop.djvu/72



"There!" he thought. "That will convey to her the first element of book morality."

These decorations having been displayed on the walls, he bethought himself of the books that should stand on the bedside shelf.

This is a question that admits of the utmost nicety of discussion. Some authorities hold that the proper books for a guest-room are of a soporific quality that will induce swift and painless repose. This school advises The Wealth of Nations, Rome under the Cæsars, The Statesman's Year Book, certain novels of Henry James, and The Letters of Queen Victoria (in three volumes). It is plausibly contended that books of this kind cannot be read (late at night) for more than a few minutes at a time, and that they afford useful scraps of information.

Another branch of opinion recommends for bedtime reading short stories, volumes of pithy anecdote, swift and sparkling stuff that may keep one awake for a space, yet will advantage all the sweeter slumber in the end. Even ghost stories and harrowing matter are maintained seasonable by these pundits. This class of reading comprises O. Henry, Bret Harte, Leonard Merrick, Ambrose Bierce, W. W. Jacobs, Daudet, de Maupassant, and possibly even On a Slow Train Through Arkansaw, that grievous classic of the railway bookstalls