Macaulay had wealth and fame, rank and power, and yet he tells us in his biography that he owed the happiest hours of his life to books. In a charming letter to a little girl, he says：“If anyone would make me the greatest king that ever lived, with palaces and gardens and fne dinners, and wines and coaches, and beautiful clothes, and hundreds of servants, on condition that I should not read books, I would not be a king. I would rather be a poor man in garret with plenty of books than a king who did not love reading.”