REPORT Or ADVISORY COMMIT THE ON BIBLIOGRAPHY 



To the Board of Trustees of the Csrnegie Institution. 



Gentlemen : Your Committee have thought that the Trustees 

 might wish to have the consideration of particular projects prefaced 

 by a survey of the general field in each department of science with 

 which it may propose to deal. In this belief the following state- 

 ment is presented : 



In the case of Bibliography a concise statement is impracticable, 

 not merely because the field is vast and indefinite (embracing as it 

 does not one science, but a consideration of the literature of all the 

 sciences), but because the work already done, or in progress, or 

 projected, is so considerable and includes undertakings so numerous 

 and so diverse in scope and method that the precise area covered by 

 them can not briefly be described with precision, 



A mere catalogue of existing bibliographies would, it is estimated, 

 comprise over 25,000 entries.* 



The appended memorandum,! drafted by Dr. J. D. Thompson and 

 other bibliographers of the staff of the Library of Congress, indicates 

 certain of the more notable achievements or projects to date. It is 

 appended, not as a complete statement of the work already done, 

 nor as a demonstration of the work which remains to be done, but 

 as a suggestion of the multitude and diversity of the undertakings 

 which must be examined before the opportunities remaining to the 

 Carnegie Institution can be fully defined. 



A brief reference to the memorandum will indicate the extraor- 

 dinary activity that has existed and still exists in bibliographic 

 research and publication. There have been bibliographies cox'ering 

 certain departments of literature, or certain periods, or certain geo- 

 graphical areas ; the literature of the past or the literature in pro- 

 cess of issue ; and even attempts (of v/hich one is still in progress) 

 to cover all the existing literature on all subjects The work has 

 been done in part as a commercial venture, in part by societies, in- 

 stitutions, or governments, as a contribution to knowledge. To 

 bibliographies, properly so called, which attempt to exhibit all the 



*Margerie's "Catalogue des bibliographies g^ologjquss " alone contains 

 nearly 4,000 entries. 

 t Not here printed. 



(i8a) 



