Few Books Stray From Farnsworth Room, Where Student Peruses "Punch" Daily and Librarian Lends a Nickel

"'Have you Stevenson's works?'"

"'Yes, on the shelf directly ahead of you, second section to the left of the mantel. They are bound in red.'

"The seeker after romance immediately went to third section to the right of the mantel and began his search on the shelf at the level of his eyes.

"This sort of thing happens over and over again. 'Having ears they hear not'," Mrs. Florence Milner, who came here ten years ago to open the Farnsworth Room in Widener on December 5, 1916, and has remained in charge of it ever since, told a Crimson reporter.'

"On another occasion," continued the experienced librarian, "I had been watching a young man diligently inspect the Emerson and Fielding shelf for some time without apparently being able to discover just what he wanted. When I asked if he could be helped he replied quickly, 'Oh, yes, I was looking to see if there was anybody here who would give me two nickels for a dime. I wanted to telphone.' I insisted that he take the only nickel. I had in change although he wanted to give me the dime. He went away happy, and returned the loan the next day.

"'I'm after "Victory" but I'm defeated', was the remark made to me in passing by another young fellow who had turned away from the Conrad shelf after seeing that someone ahead of him had the book he wanted.

"There is another man who has read 'Punch' omnivorously every day for two years. He has mastered the complete set dating from 1894 and is now anxiously waiting for the 1926 volume."

Mrs. Milner remarked that men have the ability to take a book and read three or four hours on a stretch, their only movement being to turn the pages. "No woman can do it," was her comment. "It is a purely masculine trait. Another thing, men like to be let alone when they are reading. Not that a 'Kipling' reader could be easily disturbed When I see a man reading 'Kipling' I know from experience that his mind is far from the Farnsworth Room."

"Last year, we lost only four books," replied Mrs. Milner when asked if many books disappeared from the shelves. "We consider them 'borrowed' as in almost every case such a book is eventually returned. 'The Patrician' strayed back after four years of mysterious wanderings."

The tradition of the Farnsworth Room is well established, it was pointed out by Mrs. Milner. "Freedom with dignity is what we strive for in the Farnsworth Room," she explained, "and it always comes if a man catches the Harvard spirit. Some men think the formality overdone, but they are the rare exceptions who do not fall into the spirit of the room."