Page:The library a magazine of bibliography and library literature, Volume 6.djvu/291

 'Library Affairs at Leeds. 279 the Library system, and now the committee is, and has for some time been in debt. The Chairman of the Committee (Aid. Frederick R. Spark, J.P.), at the July meeting of the City Council, laid the whole question before that body, and asked for powers to increase the Library rate. The figures he gave were remarkable, and entirely set at rest the croakings of those and there are many who assert that for novel- readers, almost wholly, are the libraries maintained. The Chairman stated that in the Central Lending Library there were 46,000 volumes. Under the head of fiction, which included poetry and the drama, there were 19,000 volumes, leaving 27,000 books of a solid and educational character. In addition, there were in the Reference Library, in which the works were entirely of an educational kind, 47,000 books. That made a total of 74,000 educational volumes, as against 19,000 classed as fiction. Then, as to the issues. Last year there were lent from the Central Library 370,000 volumes. Of these issues, 220,000 were books of fiction and 150,000 educational volumes. Adding to the latter total, as it was proper to do, the issues in the Reference Department, the number of educational works issued was 285,000, compared with the 220,000 of fiction. It should, however, be also borne in mind that whereas a novel could be read in three or four days, the educational books were often out for six weeks at a time. The branches showed the same tale. Then, if they took the visits to the newsroom and he would remark that that at the Central Library was in a back street, and far too small in 1874 they numbered 217,500, but last year the total was 1,627,600. In addition 250,000 visits were paid to the Art Gallery. The borrowers of books comprised people of every class, and he had undeniable testimony of the value of the library to students. Dr. Forsyth, the Head Master of the Higher Grade School, wrote stating that it was of inestimable value to his pupils, whose reading was guided by the teachers, but the Doctor added this sentence, " I regret I cannot speak in such laudatory terms of the scientific books." That, said Aid. Spark, was simply because the committee had not been able to keep abreast of the times owing to want of funds. So much for what had been done. As for the work that needed doing, he would instance the abolition of the penny fees for vouchers, which last year realised 100. There was needed an ex- tension of the system of school libraries. There were about sixty schools in the city in which no libraries were to be found, thirty-one Board schools and six Church schools being supplied. More branch libraries were required, there was an outcry for a musical library, and the plan of giving lectures, tried with such success last year, might be carried further. The proposition book kept at the library contained numbers of entries which the committee could not at present consider, because of the lack of means to purchase the volumes, and many thousands of works now in circulation were in such a bad condition that they ought to be at once destroyed. In spite of every endeavour to economize, the com- mittee were now face to face with a debt of ^400. Aid. Spark, in con- clusion, appealed to all the members of the Council to consider the resolution favourably. There was no treasure so good and so abiding as knowledge. Of the 81 pennies which made up the total rate at present, none produced more good than the one which was devoted to library purposes, and none was more appreciated by the public at large. In the discussion which followed, the opponents confined themselves mainly to attacks on the Art Gallery, and the " outsiders " who form part of the art committee. The vote was against any increase in the rate, by 23 to 17 ; and now the Library committee will consider in what direction to curtail the good work which has been done. 21