EVOLUTION OF .SCIENTIFIC SERIALS. 
237 
300 readers, he ought to realize that it is only fair for him 
to spend five hours upon a single sentence if he can there¬ 
by render it intelligible one minute more quickly. The 
primary requirement of the author, which is held in com¬ 
mon with the student, is prompt publication. The force 
of this demand on the part of the author cannot well be 
overestimated ; it is the incentive to investigation; it is 
the spur to subsequent labor at the desk, and it is the stim¬ 
ulus to publication, often at great personal sacrifice. Any 
plan that prevents prompt publication stifles scientific en¬ 
thusiasm, and any device that promotes prompt publication 
vivifies science and enlarges knowledge. Subordinate re¬ 
quirements of the author are (1) publication of his papers 
in convenient form for the use of the bibliographer and 
student; (2) publication under his own name that the re¬ 
sponsibility and credit may appear prima facie; and (3) 
publication in such form that he may obtain and distribute 
copies of his own treatises at will. The last of these require¬ 
ments has led tq the development of a form of publication 
known as the author’s separate, which is the bane of the 
bibliographer and the burden of the librarian, since it com¬ 
monly involves needless duplication of editions. Emphatic 
protests on the part of students and bibliographers against 
re-paging such separates were widely published a few years 
ago, and the nuisance has been thereby in part abated; but 
still this form of publication remains an unsightly excres¬ 
cence on the genealogic tree of scientific serials. There 
is a fancied requirement of the author for fine printing, heavy 
paper, broad margins, and sumptuous binding which is an¬ 
tagonistic to the legitimate requirement of wide distribution 
of his writings, and need not be seriously considered. The 
author has another interest which is directly antagonistic 
to the just requirements of the publisher: in seeking to 
economize time and energy the author may slight his lit¬ 
erary and artistic work and prepare his manuscript badly; 
but since slovenly manuscript costs publishers much more 
than its improvement would cost the author, and since the 
28—Bull. Phil. Soc., Wash., Vol. 11. 
