268 Edward Livingston Youmans. 



he chose such as could be recommended to the Apple- 

 tons for republication. His sagacity in this regard 

 was marked ; scarcely a volume he selected failed to 

 find a satisfactory demand. Among the authors of 

 note first introduced to the American public through 

 his agency were Bagehot, Bain, Buckle, Carpenter, 

 Darwin, Helmholtz, Huxley, Lecky, Lubbock, Mauds- 

 ley, Roscoe, Sully, and Tyndall. In this department 

 of their business, as already observed, the Appletons 

 were no less honourable than enterprising. They an- 

 ticipated the benefits of international copyright by 

 paying foreign authors the same rate that was paid to 

 American authors. It occurred to Youmans that this 

 business was capable of being systematized and devel- 

 oped. He suggested that a series of new works be un- 

 dertaken, covering the entire field of modern science, 

 to be simultaneously issued on both sides of the Atlan- 

 tic. This scheme was in pursuance of a favourite and 

 eminently sensible idea of his. He realized that pop- 

 ular scientific books adapted to the general reader are 

 apt to be written by third-rate men who do not well 

 understand their subject ; they are apt to be dry or 

 superficial, or both. No one can write so good a pop- 

 ular book as the master of a subject, if he only has a 

 fair gift of expressing himself and keeps in mind the 

 public for which he is writing. The master knows 

 what to tell and what to omit, and can thus tell much 

 in a short compass and still make it interesting ; more- 

 over, he avoids the inaccuracies which are sure to 

 occur in second-hand work. Masters of subjects are 

 apt, however, to be too much occupied with origi- 

 nal research to write popular books. It was You- 

 mans's plan to induce the leading men of science in 

 Europe and America to contribute small volumes on 



