Page:The small library. A guide to the collection and care of books (IA smalllibraryguid00browiala).pdf/15

 On these lines, this little book aspires to be a guide to those modest people who are not yet cocksure of their literary knowledge and taste, and who are not too proud to consider the suggestions of another book-lover. To such kindred spirits there is a certain measure of pleasurable excitement in running down old favourites in what may be considered a Book-Title Anthology, and even more delight in spotting omissions. There is little charm in absolutely perfect catalogues or anthologies, Your ideal works of this kind ought to have a great function to fulfil as stimulators of the error-hunter and instigators of that kind of research for omissions which gives pleasure to thousands of book-users. It will therefore be a double delight to the author of this book if it succeeds in satisfying, occasionally, the needs of the modest library-builder, while giving the ardent omission-hunter abundant scope for marginal remarks and interleaved annotations. The claims of the small library have been so greatly overshadowed by those of the more showy and, in many respects, more important large library, that comparatively little literature of a useful kind exists relating to book collections in their early stages as select and special private libraries of various kinds. By small library is meant the select general collection of books numbering from 200 to 5,000 volumes, such as may be gathered by students, schools, churches, commercial and industrial organizations, and all agencies in which books are either tools, or a valuable means of