BEAUTIFUL BOOK MAKING 
What is declared by experts in bibliography or in 
paleography to be the most beautiful book ever 
made is the Book of Kells,** so called because of the 
little town in the abbey of which it was probably 
made and in which after being long lost it was found 
in comparatively modern times. It is preserved in 
Trinity College library, Dublin, the most precious 
treasure of the old institution's valuable collection. 
The book consists of a copy of the Scriptures exe- 
cuted manifestly with the most loving care and with- 
out regard for the time and labor required for its 
execution. The illuminations are beautiful almost 
beyond description. The book must be seen to be 
properly appreciated but it must be studied long and 
carefully for all its excellencies of art to become 
clear. It has been the subject of reverential study 
by many of the specialists in paleography who are 
familiar with the other great manuscript treasures 
of the world and they are a unit in declaring it the 
most beautiful of them all. 
Miss Stokes, of the famous family of Irish arche- 
ologists, who knows the book well from faithful 
study for years and who had doubtless read every- 
thing written with regard to it up to her time, is en- 
thusiastic over the beauty and artistic variety of the 
volume. She dwelt particularly on the marvels of 
art that occur in the first half dozen pages of the 
book. Her years of study and her refined taste gave 
her the right to an opinion on the subject and the 
quotation of it affords the best evidence for the su- 
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