I love and collect old books. Books give me serenity. My first experience being exposed to books was when I was 6 years old and my Dad took me to the library. I fell in love and could not believe there was a house with all those books. It stuck with me and I have had this love affair all my life.
My oldest book is actually a Math book or as they called it then Arithmetic. Printed and published in 1821. Title page says it is a schoolmaster's assistant book. One of the recommendations is by Noah Webster, Dec 12, 1799. Things were worded different 200 years ago but concepts of math remain the same. For example, some of the words they used were Tare, which was the allowance made to the buyer and Trett, which is an allowance of 4lb on every 104 lbs for waste and dust. Example: What is the neat weight of 4 hogsheads of tobacco etc. This one is also confusing. If to my age there added be,1/2, 1/3 and 3 x 3, six score and 10 the sum will be; What is my age, pray shew (not a typo) it m? Answer 66. What?? Confusing. We think math is hard these days.
I actually came across the book with the family with pumpkins today that you see in my picture. Not sure where I picked it up at. It is copyrighted in 1909 and titled "The Summers
Readers". It has stories along with illustrations for each month of the year. Today, being Halloween, the story was titled Hallowe'en. I thought the illustration was adorable.
No matter how old and how poor the condition might be these old books are dear to me.
They always hold a world that is not familiar and needs to be explored. They are like adventures at my beck and call. A time to curl up and escape.