Page:The library a magazine of bibliography and library literature, Volume 6.djvu/308

 296 The Library. the treasure-houses of the past, treasure-houses in which are deposited all the wisdom, the experience, the art, the wit, the poetry, the philosophy, the recorded achievements, the fears, the hopes, the gropings after truth which have been accumulating amongst mankind through countless generations. But not only are they the treasure-houses of the past, they are also the arsenals of the future. They furnish the " TTOU ?Tc5," the fulcrum through whose instrumentality the world of the centuries to be will be lifted to a higher level. They supply to its destined benefactors the tools with which they will have to work. But to what use could we put these vast legacies of our fore- fathers, these huge, unmanageable Babylons of the pen, if their contents were not analysed, co-ordinated, tabulated, subdivided, and each item placed within our reach at a moment's notice, to every man according to his need, by your learned and laborious assistance? I believe that every year Great Britain alone is overwhelmed by a recurring deluge of 7,000 new books. What would become of suffocated humanity under this visitation if you did not reach us out a helping hand ? It is you who evoke order out of chaos, who convert a mob into an army, and what would otherwise be an undistinguishable heap of rubbish into well-ordered jewel chambers of lucent and clear-cut gems. Not only so, but it is you who take charge of the new-born product of the author's labouring brain from the moment when it first presents itself in the repulsive form of an illegible manuscript. It is you who teach us on what paper it should be couched, in what type it should be swaddled, in what binding clothed. You instruct us as to the arrangement of its future domicile ; how our book-shelves may be best arrayed, ventilated, and kept dry ; how space can be economised, and the volumes which soar to the ceiling rendered as accessible as those on the ground floor. And here I may mention that I have at Clandeboye a chair which was invented by the late Sir William Sterling Maxwell of Keir, a most deviceful bookman, which is not only a light and ornamental piece of furniture, but also serves as a ladder and a desk without change of form or ceasing to be a chair. But, rising above these minor details and mere mechanics of your craft, you have also solved that most difficult of problems, the construction of a good catalogue of a catalogue which at a glance enables an inquirer, without taking a wrong turn, to wander through the devious and complicated labyrinth of whatever subject may be occupying his attention.