10 Kojnsas Academy of Science. 



LIBRARY. 



Since the last report the library has had a steady growth. Few 

 purchases have been made, but about fifty bound volumes of gov- 

 ernment publications have been received and placed on our shelves. 

 Many of these are quartos, and nearly all are large-sized volumes, 

 well printed, and of much intrinsic value. 



Most of our accessions come to us as unbound pamphlets from 

 other scientific bodies in exchange for our own Transactions. These 

 bulletins are filed away till volumes are completed and ready to be 

 sent to the bindery. During the past year over 500 volumes have 

 been placed in the hands of the state printer and will soon be nicely 

 bound. 



We need more shelf-room for our books, and among the things 

 to be asked for by us from this legislature is an appropriation for 

 bookcases sufficient for 2500 volumes. Our Transactions are the 

 capital which we use in building up our library, and these have 

 been hitherto stored in one of the small committee rooms, but in 

 preparing for the legislature our books had to be moved out into 

 the corridor, where they now lie, with no protection from depreda- 

 tion. 



We still need an index catalogue of our books, and to prepare 

 this much time, labor and expert knowledge are required. The 

 most that can be done by your secretary, without clerical help, is 

 to arrange the books in sets according to language and place of 

 publication, and place them on the shelves with some approxima- 

 tion to order and utility. 



It has been proposed to have a State Library Commission, which 

 shall have charge of all the state-house collections of books, and 

 then have a general and complete catalogue made according to the 

 best modern system. This would enable the users of books to find 

 whether the information sought is to be found in the state-house, 

 and, if so, where to get it. The state library cataloguers have been 

 at work for some years on a Dewey catalogue, and the State His- 

 torical Society has made some progress in cataloguing its very 

 large collection of books. The great fault now is that these libra- 

 ries do not work together. There is much needless duplication of 

 books, especially of government publications, and there can be no 

 general classification of books into departments. A library com- 

 mission with a competent head librarian could rectify all these 

 faults and greatly increase the value of the state-house books which 

 is the largest collection in our state. When this is done, and when 

 the state provides a suitable building for its libraries and museums, 



