AFTER first reading the "Duet," I thot this little story sufficient without further comment or

answer.

An Episcopal rector in Mass. some 30 years ago announced a sermon on Christmas observance. All the churches about him lookt with horror on the decorations and services as pagan and Romish customs which Christians should shun. For the sermon he rehearst fairly all the objections brot against the observance without making the slightest answer to any one of them. At the close of the list he removed his glasses and lookt over the congregation with a look more eloquent than words, and said: "Well, who cares? Let us pray." To-day I am told there isn't a church within 20 miles of where this happened that does not hav Christmas services of some kind.

To those who know the facts no further answer will be needed. But others may read the Duet who hav not access to the D. C., and will form totally false impressions without some corrections. I felt that a single article in which my name occurs 72 times might fairly be treated as somewhat personal.* Tho I at first declined to put myself on its plane by answering it, since it has found its way into print it has seemed best to others that a reply appear. This I regret, for it is impossible to join in a Duet without falling somewhat into its key, however much one disapproves it.

In reading this Duet it must be remembered that ridicule isn't argument, and that mere statements are in this case often not facts; that quotations are garbled in some cases, and in others very ingeniously taken from their context, to mislead as to the author's evident meaning; that in this spirit a battalion of men of straw hav been set up, and then with a flourish knockt down.

The Duet charges: 1. That the author of the

* This answer was all written on reading galley proof of the Duet. As it appears in the JOURNAL I find changes, evidently wisely made by the editor, which giv it a little less personal tone, e.g., "His Bigotry and Virtue," in my proof now appears as "5. Some examples of personal equation.'" As these more offensiv parts were cut out before printing, I hav tried to avoid reference to them. This note is to explain anything written with the original proof before me and overlookt in the hurried revision. Had the editorial knife been used much more freely the Duet would hav been still further improved.

D. C. prohibits others from using his valuable plan; 2. That the authors of the Duet were its real inventors, and 3. That it isn't good for anything any way.

Tho urged to do so, I hav repeatedly declined to put the Decimal Classification on the program or bring it up in the A. L. A. or the JOURNAL lest any evil-disposed person might say that they were being used to push my own plan. But this Duet opens with a charge so unjust, that some explanation is necessary of its overture which fairly shows its motivs.

These joint authors hav between them made some four or five classifications resembling each other, more or less, yet differing enuf, so that a library would hav to be renumbered in changing. (We say "made," tho possibly they may hav now and then used a heading that some other classifier had used. Maybe his ghost will some day come back to accuse them, with more fierceness than fairness, of plagiarism.) With unusually wide opportunities for finding out, we hav yet learned of but one library adopting any one of their five schemes. Meantime it was my fortune to steal, as I now learn for the first time, a collection of the best ideas invented by these joint authors and other old masters, and putting a series of blunders of my own with them, the Decimal Classification started its remarkable career. The worthless, immoral thing has kept spreding till its users are dotted over the whole country, with not a few in Europe and the East; and these users add insult to injury by not only using it, but by giving in many cases unsolicited and glowing testimony to its practical convenience, value and improvement over any plans before used. Only to-day three more were added to the list of users, one in Conn., the other two prominent libraries in London. That such base coin should circulate so widely while the pure gold of the various schemes by the joint authors should remain in the mint, has clearly been unendurable, and the Duet appears as a terrible warning to all these librarians to save themselves from their own ignorance in adopting the D. C.

We are in danger of appearing troubled at any criticism of the D. C. So far from this we prize just criticism because it will help to improve the only plan, so far as we know, that has ever been

very largely adopted by libraries for common use. We askt a critic to point out in print, frankly but fairly, its weak points, for we know it has them. We hav sent circulars and letters to every user and owner of the book, urging the fullest criticism. Some faults cannot be cured, but inhere in the system. We are willing to admit them frankly. Users must decide whether for them its peculiar advantages (whoever invented" them) outweigh its peculiar faults-e.g., our numbers can never be quite as short as Mr. Cutter's, for he has a larger base to work from. I greatly wish we could hav our present simplicity and numbers as short as his. In minute work our decimals are a little less simple to a page who has not got to decimals in his arithmetic than the straight whole numbers with which Wm. T. Harris numbered his St. Louis scheme in 1870, and with which the first edition of the "Rational Classification" appeared ten years later. But this is very trifling compared to the advantages to be secured in no other way.

Again, there are too many printers' blunders in this temporary edition. We planned to

send advance sheets to users for correction. On trial it was clear that as thoro revision as we were ambitious to secure could be had only by some months of actual use. A special circular, cancelling all orders received on the other plan was sent out, and this book hastily printed, the type being held for corrections, and the publishers agreeing to furnish all who bot this temporary edition with a copy thoroly revised, at a nominal price, so no one could complain of having to buy two copies. Meantime a sheet of errata to gard against mistakes in use is now beHundreds ing printed for each owner of a copy.

of new heads for the index hav been already secured, and it is hoped that most of the mistakes hav been found and corrected.

The index as printed contains the heads of our interlined copies, to which were added at the last minute the topics in the tables. In doing this some laughable words got in from the fine type notes which will, of course, be dropt in the final printing, tho by no means all the words that are pilloried in this Duet.

Some important divisions were omitted in the

* A year later the revised version of the Rational Classification abandoned these simple numbers and gained vastly more than it lost in conceding something to mnemonics, and like the D. C. making the initial significant of the class. On this point see the admirable yearly Report on Classification at the Cincinnati Conference, LIB. J. 7: 129.

decimal sub-sections waiting special revisions, and are to go, without cost, to each owner, in form to be pasted in. This fact was plainly printed. (See e.g., 610, 720, 840.) Of course all this corrects itself in the next edition, and is mentioned here only to show the spirit of this Duet. The notes and explanations are ignored, except when they can be twisted into a target for ridicule. So many cases occur that would mislead one not specially familiar with the facts, that it is impossible not to think them intentional. Such writing is not criticism, but resembles rather the biografies of the rival candidates as printed in the partisan papers just before a hotlycontested election. Such a review deceives some and disgusts others, but profits none.

The matter referred to on page 7 is:

"Experience has proved that much confusion results from printing unauthorized editions with various changes. The numbers are given a new meaning, and endless inquiries and explanations, corrections, etc., arise from young catalogers accepting these changed numbers and trying to reconcile them with the general index. While every person is at liberty to make all the changes he pleases in ms., it is found necessary to forbid all printing in violation of the copyright."

"No user's freedom will be needlessly hampered by the copyright. If the advantages of using the system in harmony with the large body who utilize each other's labors are not convincing,