We regret exceedingly to observe an official notification that Lord
Spencer, pressed by the fall in agricultural rents or other causes, has decided to sell the Althorp Library, said to be the finest private library in the world, if possible by private contract as a whole; but if otherwise, by public auction next year. The library contains a great quantity of the rare editions for which rich collectors contend, and which, from the literary point of view, are usually worthless, or rather, worth just as much as the cheaper editions; but it is also a grand collection of the great books of -the world. It is said that such dispersions do nobody any harm; but to say that is simply to say that no library is of any use, and that the aggregation of books, which has been a passion with thinkers in all ages, has no justification. It seems to be forgotten that libraries protect and concentrate the sources of learning, and that a student neither can nor will follow up an inquiry through a hundred secluded houses.
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