642 JUSTIN WINSOR. 



qualities of his boyhood followed him to college and grew stronger 

 tliere. He led the same half solitary life, devoting most of his time 

 to reading by himself. He both read and wrote with the furious energy 

 that always characterized hira ; yet at the time his efforts seemed fruitless, 

 or at least misdirected. Before coming to college he had, it is true, 

 written a History of the Town of Duxbury, which was published in his 

 Freshman year ; but although his ambition lay in literature, he met 

 with no further success to encourage him. He took, for example, a great 

 interest in the stage, and wrote dramas that were never acted. In 1850 

 he planned a life of Garrick, and for the next fifteen years he worked 

 ujDou it, collecting a vast quantity of materials, but it never saw the light. 

 He did not abandon, however, his love for historic research, and about 

 this time he devised a systematic method of taking and arranging notes 

 of his reading. This he continued to employ until near the end of his 

 life, and by its aid- he accumulated a reservoir of knowledge that was 

 invaluable when an active career opened before him. 



Although essentially a scholar, Mr. Winsor paid little attention to the 

 curriculum of the College. At last it became irksome, positively re|)ul- 

 sive to him, and, instead of graduating with his class in 1853, he left 

 College, with the approval of President Sparks, at the beginning of his 

 Senior year, and sailed for Europe. The next two years he spent in 

 Paris and Heidelberg, reading, of course, assiduously, learning the 

 languages, and preparing a book of translations and criticisms of Ger- 

 man poetry. This again was never published as a whole, though many 

 parts of it afterwards appeared in a fugitive form in several magazines. 



In the autumn of 1854 he came home, and the next fourteen years were 

 passed in study, and in writing frequent literary contributions for "The 

 Crayon," '• The Round Table," and other periodicals. A great deal of 

 work was devoted also to his life of Garrick, which was brought nearly 

 to completion ; but as yet he had not found his true career. He had 

 been industrious, but far less successful than his talents warranted, 

 because his immense energy had not been turned in a direction where it 

 could be effective. It is impossible to say how long it would have been 

 before he discovered the right path, if an accident, or something very like 

 an accident, had not revealed it to him. 



In 1866 lie was appointed a Trustee of the Boston Public Library, and 

 the next year he made a report which attracted attention, and showed 

 that he had grasped in a most extraordinary degree the problem of 

 managing a great public library. In fact it outlined the changes that he 

 was himself to carry out within the next few years. It so happened 



