6 



Henry Augustus Homes. 



great as a librarian by virtue of his exclusive devotion to the exacting 

 duties of his well-loved profession. 



This is a matter of no little importance in these days when even the 

 chiefs of great libraries look outside of the library field to special lines 

 of activity and research for a more enduring fame. It may well be 

 doubted whether a man is a better librarian by virtue of being a dis- 

 tinguished historian, or editor, or philosopher ; whether, indeed, suc- 

 cess in a special line of intellectual activity or devotion to a particular 

 branch of human knowledge is entirely compatible with that broad 

 and catholic, yet discriminating knowledge of books which it is the 

 peculiar province of the librarian to illustrate. 



This intimate and yet comprehensive knowledge of books, Dr. Homes 

 possessed in an eminent degree. His interest ranged as wide as the 

 printed word, and his vision kept pace with his interest. All arts, all 

 sciences, all literatures were his province. Nothing escaped him. 

 He knew by an unerring instinct the best books, the books that 

 were destined to survive, in all languages and in all departments of 

 knowledge. On the other hand, he never fell a victim to the fatal con- 

 fusion of mind of G-oethe's traveler who saw not the forest by reason 

 of the wilderness of trees about him. While preeminently a man of 

 books, he never lost the library in the volumes which he accumulated 

 on its shelves ; he never forgot that the books he sought were to take 

 their places in the ranks of the great army of occupation which he 

 was marshaling and for which he was recruiting. 



Then, too, he was a genuine bibliophile. He loved books and the 

 atmosphere which emanated from them, but he loved them wisely — 

 not too well. With abundant means, and with unrivaled facilities for 

 the gratification of the master passion of the book-lover, he left 

 behind him but a meagre private library. The unique volume, cov- 

 eted by the collector, appealed to him in vain ; while the sorry pamphlet, 

 caught up out of the ruin of a lost cause, claimed his instant alle- 

 giance. He was too sane, too disinterested ever to become the slave 

 of his books. In these, as in other respects, he was preeminently 

 fitted for the place which he so long and honorably filled. The mere 

 human book-worm is almost as much to be dreaded in such a position 

 as is h is insidious prototype among the leaves. The man with a hobby, 

 the specialist, the collector, the worshippers of tooled-edges and book- 

 plates—are all alike to be shanned. If they do not belong to the 

 hateful profanum vulgus, against whom the doors of all sanctuaries 

 are closed, they are yet by virtue of their ruling passion conspicuously 

 unfitted for the labor which the late chief of our great library so ably 

 performed through a generation of laborious years. 



