BETTER late than never, a pile of overdue books has mysteriously been returned to Christchurch library more than 30 years after they were borrowed.

Staff at town's Druitt Library in the High Street were astonished when they discovered the parcel of books stamped with a return date of April 1 - 1971!

When the books were issued, Christchurch was still in Hampshire and Britain had just changed to decimal currency.

And the books, all concerned with the history of costume, were probably borrowed by a young fashion student at a time when young people were wearing flares, hot pants and platform shoes.

Among the titles were A History of Ladies Underwear, by Cecil Saint-Laurent, and a lavishly illustrated volume in the Hugh Evelyn History of Costume series covering the period from 1660 to 1800, as well as treatises on mediaeval and 17th century fashions.Senior librarian Jan Taylor said: "It was all a bit of a mystery where they came from. They just turned up with a note saying 'trust this will be in order' and an illegible signature."

The old-fashioned date stamp - now superseded by bar codes - four-digit library phone number and the Hampshire County Council logo on the title pages of the books made it obvious that the tomes had been out of circulation for a long time.

But despite being "lost" for more than three decades the books, the oldest of which was five years old when it was issued, have come back in good condition and will be available for lending again.

Meanwhile, library staff, many of them who were not even born when the books were issued, have calculated that at the current rate of charges for late returns the unknown borrower could have incurred more than £7,000 in fines.

"We will not be chasing him or her for the fines.

"It would be almost impossible to trace who the borrower was because it was so long ago and all the records from then will be kept by Hampshire," said Mrs Taylor.

"We are just so pleased to get the books back and put them back into stock."