ies of all the sects.

He may frequently be asked for information on a subject which he knows
nothing about; and I have heard a librarian declare, that he often found
himself able to give fuller and better information on a subject of which
he was previously ignorant, than upon one he had long been familiar with.
The reason was that in the one case he had freshly looked up all the
authorities, and put them before the reader, while in the other, giving
the references from a memory, more or less imperfect, he had overlooked
some of the most important means of information.

The constant exercise of the habit of supplying helps to readers is a
splendid intellectual school for the librarian himself. Through it, his
memory is quickened and consequently improved, (as every faculty is by
use) his habits of mental classification and analysis are formed or
strengthened, and his mind is kept on the alert to utilize the whole
arsenal of the knowledge he has already acquired, or to acquire new
knowledge.

Another very important benefit derived by the librarian from his
constantly recurring attention to the calls of readers for aid, is the
suggestion thereby furnished of the deficiencies in the collection in his
charge. This will be a continual reminder to him, of what he most needs,
namely, how to equip the library with the best and most recent sources of
information in every field of inquiry. Whether the library be a large or
a small one, its deficiencies in some directions are sure to be very
considerable: and these gaps are more conspicuously revealed in trying to
supply readers with the means of making what may be termed an exhaustive
research upon a given subject, than in any other way. You find, for
example, in looking up your authorities in what has come to be called
Egyptology, that while you have Wilkinson's Ancient Egypt, and Lane's
Modern Egyptians, both of which are very valuable works, you have not the
more modern books of Brugsch-Bey, or of A. H. Sayce, or of Maspero. You
may also find out, by mingling freely with a good part of the readers,
what subjects are most frequently looked into or inquired about, and you
can thus secure valuable information as to the directions in which the
library most needs strengthening. Thus, in a community largely made up of
people connected with manufacturing interests, the inquiries are liable
to be much concerned with the mechanic arts; and you would therefore
naturally seek to acquir