Years ago at in the basement of the Strand I saw a volume of The Correspondence of Erasmus; I don't remember the number. I opened it to a random page and read a letter written to him by a friend on the road. He was writing at an inn at the end of a day, describing the goings on: eating and drinking, laughter, noise, viewing the people around him from a distance, only as an educated man looking at less educated people who could otherwise be his peers. I've never forgotten it and I should have bought the damn book.