37 [ 108 1 



view taken of the matter in other countries. In England, the copy is 

 required for the British Museum, (which sustains a rehition to the British 

 government simihir to that v/hicli the Smithsonian Institution does to our 

 own,) and not for the library of the House of Commons, or any library of 

 the executive departments. 



I am unable to say whether or not the deposit is desired by the guar- 

 dians of the library of Congress. There is no doubt, however, that two or 

 even three copies would be cheerfully granted by all publishers in this coun- 

 try, if they could be sure thai the purposes of the deposit would be 

 ans'wered. The dissatisfaction which has hitherto been expressed has arisen 

 entirely from the indefiniteness of the law, the difficulty of complying with 

 it, and the doubt whether the deposit would be safely guarded, anil ren- 

 dered available for the object for which it is made. 



Statistics of Libraries. — During the year, the report which I had the 

 honor to present in January, 1859, upon the public libraries of the United 

 States, has been printed. I continued to add to it, up to the time of its 

 going to press, such new information as I was able to collect upon the 

 various libraries; and the report constitutes a valurae of more than two 

 hundred pages. It has been widely distributed throughout the country. 

 Durincr the last three or four months we have received statements from 

 upwards of a hundred libraries, more full and accurate than those which 

 had before been presented. I hope to be able within a year or two to pre- 

 pare a full account of these institutions. 



The stereotyped Catalogue. — In my last report I presented, at consider- 

 able length, a plan for the stereotyping of catalogues by separate, movable 

 titles, with a statement ol the advantages which it was supposed would 

 result from the system. The plan was referred to a commission of libra- 

 rians and literary gentlemen, for the purpose of obtaining their opinion as 

 to its value and feasibility. Their report was in all respects favorable, and 

 I was authorized to proceed with the work. During the year I have 

 bestowed much attention to the carrying out of the project. 



Three methods of stereotyping had been devised, and it remained to be 

 decided which of the three offered the greatest advantages. The first was 

 by the electrotype process; the second by a modification of the common 

 method of stereotyping; the third by a new process, patented by Mr. Josiah 

 Warren, of Iiuliana. The last seemed to offer peculiar facilities, and pro- 

 mised to be much more economical than either of the other methods ; but 

 its applicability to our purposes had not been sufficiently tested. With the 

 assistance of the patentee, I instituted a series of experiments in order to 

 satisfy ourselves upon this pomt. The results were submitted to the judg- 

 ment of a commission, who, after witnessing the process for manufacturing 

 titles upon separate blocks, and carefully examining the work executed, 

 recommended the adoption of this })rocess in preference to the others. 



These experiments were of course made with imperfect instruments. It 

 was necessary before commencing the work in earnest to devise the best 

 form of apparatus to be used. This required another extended series of 

 experiments. These were completed as early as the month of April, but it 

 was impossible to obtain the a})paratus, ready for use, until the month of 

 October. Everything connected with typogra])hy requires a great deal of 

 exactness. It is very difficult to find workmen sufficiently skilful and care- 

 ful to manufacture the machinery and apparatus. It was necessary also to 

 instruct a workman in the manipulations of the art, Owing to delays from 



