Page:Library Administration, 1898.djvu/182

 in the United States (though the library of Cornell University has adopted a modification of the British Museum system); it is common in the "Free" Libraries in this country, and is used at the Bibliothèque Nationale in Paris, in the newer parts of the library of the University of Cambridge, and other large libraries. The essence of the system is, as the name implies, that the books are numbered or lettered (or both) consecutively from shelf to shelf, and may be moved backwards or forwards as occasion dictates, provided this order be preserved. To make this movement feasible from end to end of a library, all the shelves would have to be tall enough for the largest folios. So the next step is to divide the library into parts, each fitted all over with shelves of the same size, and each allowing its contents to be shifted freely within its own borders. If the number of different parts were considerable, this would, theoretically, be an excellent device, except that the spirit of prophecy would be required, as it is in the other system, to forecast the areas of the respective parts. Practically, however, the requirements of classification appear on the scene at this point, and a system which required the searcher to visit as many different parts of the library as the books in his subject could be divided into sizes, would hardly commend itself. It has