REPORT OF THE SECRETARY. 107 



1875, tbo authorsliip of wliich is ntliil>ut(Ml iiriiiciiijilly to the representatives of 

 Frauce; Avere stricken out of the amended articles considered in 1883 at the in- 

 stance of Franco ; and in 1886 that Government declined to take further part in the 

 conference. 



It is, in fact, scarcely possible for the exchange odices of most foreign countries to 

 procure all of the ofdeial puldicatioua of their Governments for exchange ]Mirpo.ses, 

 the ))ub]ishiug arrangements of the governmental departments being for the most 

 ])art (juite separate and distinct from one another, .and there being no law, except in 

 the United States and Belgium, requiring them to'furnisli copies for this purpose. It 

 is indeed extremely dithcult even for the ex(;liange .agent of a Goverment to ascer- 

 tain what the otlicial publications of the ditl'erent departments and bureaus are. 



The text of the two conventions as finally .agreed to by the conference of 188G is 

 l>rest!nted herewith as Exhibit B. 



During the i»ast year some unusual pains have l)een taken in the etVorts to increase 

 the number of official publications received from foreign countries, it appearing th.at 

 the United States Government now sends out about twenty times as many jiackages 

 to other Governmeu Is as it receives from them, and that this disproportion has been 

 annually on the increase for several years p.ast. (See Exhibit G. ) With some difli- 

 cnlty and at the cost of much correspondence a list, still not complete, of P^rench 

 otlicial publications has be(!n compiled, containing four hundred and twenty -one titles. 

 Of these the library of the Smithsonian Institution received during the calendar 

 year 1887 thirtj-niue titles and the National Library forty-ouc^ titles. 



During the tiscal year 1887-'8H three shipments were received from the French Bu- 

 reau des Echanges, on the (!th of June and thi^ Hth of December, 1887, and the 12th of 

 April, isss, containing nine official packages for the Libr.ary of Congress. The niim- 

 lier of titles contained in these nine packages can not now be precisely stated, but 

 was probably not greater than that received during the calendar year. 



On the other hand, there were four shipments of official publications to Frauce 

 from this country during the fiscal year, containing seven hundred and sixty-three 

 ])ackages of official iiublications. 



What has just been said relates only to the international cxchangeof offieialpublica- 

 tions, iuteiiih^d for the national libraries of the Governmer.ts parti('ipating. By far 

 the larg(U- part of all of the business of this oitice is actually governnieutal business, 

 a eonsi<lerable iiropcutioii of the so-called " literary and scientific" exchanges being 

 really an exchange of offi(;ial i)iil)lica-tions between the Imreaus or ofti(!ial subdivis- 

 ions of the dillerent Governments, for the benelit of the Itureau libraries, and not for 

 that of central or national libr.aries, .as coiitcmi)lated by the inlcriiational agreement!* 

 alreaily referred to (Exhibit 15). " 



Most of the foreign GovernnuMit bureaus, and of our own as well, desire to enrich 

 their individual libraries, and do not rcgjird the deposit of one set of the publications 



'These publications are as strictly a part of tlu^ "official or governmental "ex- 

 changes as are those jirovided for by the resolution of Congress granting fifty copies for 

 foreign natioiiiil libraries. While, therefore, long usage has sanctioned thedesignations 

 " litcniry au<l scientific" and " official," in the sense exi)lained above, I think that in 

 the interest of convfMiience and intelligibility, hereafter it will be better to express 

 simply th(5 distinction which really exists, namely, that between the official and un- 

 official exchanges, by the a<l,jections " governmental " and " miscellaneous ; " meaning 

 by the former all publications sent or received by tins (jtoveriiment or its biir(>aus, ,and 

 )»y the latter all others. The publications of the Smithsonian Instilution, which 

 are partly " goveriunental " and partly " miscellaneous," although divided so far as 

 the exch.ange rci-ords and statistics are concerued, are accounted for as .a whole by 

 the office routine of the Institution. I am not aware of any other office or orgaui/a- 

 tion whose publications would not fall wholly within one or the other of these 

 classes. 



