First:  about the mental nourishment that is absorbed in browsing; the specific information, the appreciation of what is good, the intellectual stimulation—­not that which comes from reading suggested or guided by browsing, but from the actual process itself.  I have heard it strenuously denied that any such absorption occurs; the bits taken are too small, the motion of the browser is too rapid, the whole process is too desultory.  Let us see.  In the first place a knowledge of authors and titles and of the general character of their works is by no means to be despised.  I heard the other day of a presumably educated woman who betrayed in a conversation her ignorance of Omar Khayyam—­not lack of acquaintance with his works, but lack of knowledge that such a person had ever existed.  If at some period in her life she had held in her hand a copy of “The Rubaiyat,” and had glanced at its back, without even opening it, how much embarrassment she might have been spared!  And if, in addition, she had glanced within for just ten seconds and had discovered that he wrote poetry in stanzas of four lines each, she would have known as much about Omar as do many of those who would contemptuously scoff at her ignorance.  With so brief effort may we acquire literary knowledge sufficient to avoid embarrassment in ordinary conversation.  Browsing in a good library, if the browser has a memory, will soon equip him with a wide range of knowledge of this kind.  Nor is such knowledge to be sneered at as superficial.  It is all that we know, or need to know, about scores of authors.  One may never study higher mathematics, but it may be good for him to know that Lagrange was a French author who wrote on analytical mechanics, that Euclid was a Greek geometer, and that Hamilton invented quaternions.  All this and vastly more may be impressed on the mind by an hour in the mathematical alcove of a library of moderate size.  And it will do no harm to a boy to know that Benvenuto Cellini wrote his autobiography, even if the inevitable perusal of the book is delayed for several years, or that Felicia Hemans, James Thomson, and Robert Herrick wrote poetry, independently of familiarity with their works, or that “Lamia” is not something to eat or “As you like it” a popular novel.  Information of this kind is almost impossible to acquire from lists or from oral statement, whereas a moment’s handling of a book in the concrete may fix it in the mind for good and all.  So far, we have not supposed that even a word of the contents has been read.  What, now, if a sentence, a stanza, a paragraph, a page, passes into the brain through the eye?  Those who measure literary effect by the thousand words or by the hour are making a great mistake.  The lightning flash is over in a fraction of a second, but in that time it may reveal a scene of beauty, may give the traveller warning of the fatal precipice, or may shatter the farmer’s home into kindling wood.  Intellectual lightning may strike the “browser” as he