Page:The library a magazine of bibliography and library literature, Volume 6.djvu/363

 The Clerkenwell Open Lending Library. 351 valuable advantages to the public, or even the saving which can be made on various items. The Clerkenwell Commissioners are not disposed to distrust the people because tradition has it they must be careless and dishonest, as it has been their experience that every new concession of trust or freedom has been met with a degree of loyalty which repression utterly failed to call forth. Petty thefts will occur, of that there is little doubt, but unless the readers utterly betray the trust which the com- missioners have unreservedly placed in them, there is but little likelihood of any change of policy being made on that account. In libraries where thefts have occurred it has almost invariably turned out that they were committed by a very few persons. This will probably be the Clerkenwell experience, and the com- missioners are prepared to face it with equanimity. Coming to the advantages of the system, it is difficult to fix on any salient points among so many which claim prominence. The enormous benefit to the readers of direct contact with the books ; the power given of examination and comparison ; the educational value of permitting readers to go about in even a roughly classified library ; and the rapidity with which ordinary readers can suit themselves, are all advantages about which there can hardly be a difference of opinion. Perhaps the phrase of one of the readers will best convey the general outside view of the change : " It is just the difference between a lottery and a certainty." The previous method of issuing books at Clerken- well was somewhat hampered with this defect ; readers did not always get exactly what they wanted or what pleased them, but only what they thought would please them. It is absolutely impossible to tell from a catalogue entry what a book is about, while on the other hand a very cursory glance over the pages of a book will enable a reader to decide with certainty, and to make a selection which will prove satisfactory. As a great majority of public library readers are hard-working people who read mostly for recreation, it is of some importance to them that their time is not wasted withdrawing books altogether unsuitable, and not changeable till the following day. So it is with the student or reader for information. Not one catalogue in a hundred makes the slightest attempt to discriminate between what is good and what is indifferent, what is out-of-date and up-to-date on any subject, so that the power of examination to such persons is absolutely necessary if they are to make the best educational use of the library. The browsing habit has not been developed as