Page:Library Construction, Architecture, Fittings, and Furniture.djvu/288

264 seventh floors, which are reached by two steam elevators.

On the top floor is placed the lending department (Fig. 118), in a noble room covering the whole area. The elevators give access to a space for the public in front of the delivery counter, 49 feet by 17. On either side two rooms are partitioned off for catalogue work, cashier, &c., and at the other end are placed the librarian's office, 20 feet by 20, and a directors' room, 30 feet by 27. The whole of the central space, 96 feet by 69, is used as a stack-room for the storage of books. It is lit from both sides, and also from a skylight occupying two-thirds of the roof area, and forms one of the best rooms for the purpose in the country. The height of the room is 25 feet, and the bookcases are arranged at right angles to the two walls, leaving a central passage 15 feet in width. It is intended to place here three stacks of bookcases, each 7 feet in height, but at present only two are in position. The bookcases are double, and are 18 inches in width, the alleys between them being 3 feet wide. Access to the second tier of cases is gained by straight flights of staircases in the central passageway, and as the cases are only 7 feet in height, ladders are entirely dispensed with (Fig. 119).

The stairs and flooring of the stack are of perforated iron, the bookcases themselves being of wood. The full storage capacity of this floor is nearly half a million volumes.

The reference department and reading-room is on the sixth floor, and is the same size as the room