REPORT OF THE SECRETARY 145 



of the Smithsonian of several new trained assistants and partly of 

 the increase in funds for the acquisition of material needed by the 

 scientists which could not be obtained by exchange. The staff entered 

 8,799 periodicals, substituting for the old system of entry a new sys- 

 tem that is being employed extensively by libraries using Library of 

 Congress cards. They catalogued 1,639 volumes, 785 pamphlets, 

 and 17 charts, or 427 more than the previous year. They also, as in 

 former years, did the cataloguing and entering for the library of the 

 National Gallery of Art, the total number of publications thus 

 treated being 311 and 533 respectively — tv/ice the number of 1930. 

 They contributed 11,193 cards to the Museum catalogue and revised 

 672 catalogue headings. They also added 8,036 cards to the shelf 

 lists, and prepared almost as many duplicate cards for the union shelf 

 list in the Smithsonian Building. They sent to the sectional libraries 

 6,522 volumes and parts and to the members of the scientific staff 

 for their personal use 1,419 reprints, many of which had come to light 

 in the process of sorting the few remaining collections of miscel- 

 laneous material in the library. They filed the Wistar Institute cards 

 as the}'^ came in, and brought up to date the filing of the large accu- 

 mulation of Concilium Bibliographicum cards of the author set, 

 17,000 cards being added to this file. The current cards of the sys- 

 tematic set were forwarded to the sections that have files on their 

 special subjects. The number of volumes bound was 1,402, or 131 

 more than in 1930. In this connection it may be added that more 

 volumes than usual were completed by special exchange letters, the 

 number of publications received in response to them being 1,090, an 

 increase of 402 over the year before. 



The number of publications loaned to the staff of the Smithsonian 

 and its branches totaled 7,221, more than one-third of which were 

 charged in the reading room of the Arts and Industries Building. 

 Of these the library borrowed 2,049 from the Library of Congress 

 and 271 elsewhere. Loans of 142 publications were made to libraries 

 not in the Smithsonian system. The number of volumes returned to 

 ihe Library of Congress was 2,519 and to other libraries 407 — in each 

 instance many more than usual. 



The main shelf list — that of the collection in the Natural History 

 Building — was completed early in the year, and the work of taking 

 an inventory was begun. This had to be discontinued, however, in 

 the fall, owing to lack of help. 



Finally, attention should be called to the fact that even with the 

 400 feet of new shelving that the Museum installed for the collection 

 in 1930 the natural history library is still in a very crowded condi- 

 tion. Sufficient space and equipment both to relieve its present con- 

 gestion and to permit of growth for a period of years should be 

 provided as soon as possible. 



