BIBLICAL LIBRARIES
other, like to talk of their little farm houses as villas and country houses. So among books. One man talks grandly about his "library", and is properly laughed at when it turns out that his collection consists chiefly of old schoolbooks and free public documents. Another man with a choice library takes pains to avoid the word library altogether and always speaks of his collection simply as his "books." In both cases it is a pose, and the pose of modesty may be as misleading as the pose of boastfulness, — although counted in much better taste.
Something like the case of the man who talks grandly if his "library" when it consists mainly of old schoolbooks and free public documents is what has sometimes happened among the Assyriologists. A library made up largely of old schoolbooks and public documents has, e.g., it is alleged, been posed to compare with that of Ashurbanapal. Some archae-
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