ch our friend
dubbed "Snippers,"--from an odd seamstress word which she had picked up
by chance.

Other "snipper" books followed when that one, years after, had been
filled.

My system is an orderly one. All my books are broad-paged and
wide-lined, thus preventing the cramped and crowded writing which often
makes such books unreadable. When I find anything which strikes me as
worth keeping, I note on a slip of paper, somewhat longer than the book
I am reading, the number of the page and make a perpendicular line
beneath it, with a cross line indicating the relative position of the
sentence which I wish to keep, thus:

[Illustration: 23]

If the page is in columns, I make, instead of the single line, a rough
parallelogram, and note within it by square dots the relative positions
of the sentences chosen for preservation, thus:

[Illustration: 187]

This slip of paper I use as a book-mark until it is filled or the book
is finished, noting upon it, as indicated, the choicest passages and
their positions on the pages. When I have finished the book I go
carefully over these selected sentences. Many are discarded; the rest go
into my "snippers." Below the first entry and to the right, I place the
name of the book and its author, both heavily underscored; below the
others, the word "Ibid" or "ditto," underscored. At the top of each page
I note the year, and at the head of each batch of extracts the month or
day.

Paragraphs cut from newspapers, which are worth saving, are pasted as a
fly-leaf to the inner edge of the page, or even slipped under the
binding thread.

In carrying out my plan I am always content with hasty work,--but I
write plainly, and if possible with ink, as much fingering destroys
pencil-marks. I once tried classifying the extracts, but this scarcely
paid for the trouble.

I used sometimes to wonder whether these books of selections were of any
real value. But I have grown now to prize them greatly. Many a time I go
to them for a dimly remembered phrase or passage. Sometimes, too, I read
them over, for of course they give me the essence of what I most like
and admire in my reading. A short time since I lent one to a literary
friend, and was surprised to find she enjoyed it so greatly that she was
almost unwilling to give it back.

I am very glad that I began this practice in my young days. It gives
very little trouble, and that little is a pleasure.

There is a familiar expression about an "emb