Though we totally commend your choice of books,
we need this title for another reader, maybe
not as charming as you but with the card holder’s
right to request it before you’ve finished reading.
Foolish you: praising this book to your friends.
One of them is behind this request. Perhaps you
should have been less verbose and more diligent
in your reading habits? Come now. Because you seem
compelled to finish this volume and too cheap to buy it,
maybe you wrote yourself a note with the page number
where you left off? You’d finished the chapters about the couple
of ex-slaves seeking respite in Scotland. You couldn’t resist
looking at the photos of their children: handsome lad, lovely girl.
But, you say, you hadn’t arrived at the juncture of their lives
where they allowed themselves to interrupt their tour
and procreate. You wondered about birth-control methods
in the 19th century? Another topic to pursue.
Return our book asap. Yours, the library.
