REPORT ON THE INTERNATIONAL CATALOGUE. 95 



source to finance the fifteenth annual issue of the Catalogue as was 

 done in 1916 when grants from the Royal Society of London and 

 from the Carnegie Foundation of New York enabled the Central 

 Bureau to make up the first deficit caused by the war and provided 

 funds for the publication of the fourteenth annual issue. 



It is felt that every effort should be made to continue the organiza- 

 tion as it now stands in spite of present and temporary difficulties 

 caused by the war, for even if the work is delayed and also to some 

 extent incomplete it is obvious that it would be a much simpler and 

 more satisfactory method to continue this great international under- 

 taking until the war is over with the present organization than it 

 would be to reorganize the work should it be allowed at any time to 

 cease or fall too far in arrears. The task of indexing much of the 

 literature being published in the countries mentioned above, whose 

 regional bureaus have closed, has fallen on the London Central 

 Bureau, and already 15,000 reference cards for the German literature 

 of 1915 have been prepared there. Whether it will be possible when 

 peace is restored to resume the former cordial cooperation with all 

 of the now hostile countries is a matter open to serious question, 

 but if this can not be done for some years to come the literature pub- 

 lished in those countries could be indexed by the Central Bureau, 

 as is evidenced by the fact that the Central Bureau has already put 

 this plan into operation. These and other questions will, however, 

 have to be finally decided by another international convention after 

 the war. 



As has been pointed out a number of times before, the International 

 Convention in London in 1910 authorized a committee to take all 

 necessarjr steps to obtain further assistance and cooperation from 

 other similar organizations in the preparation of the Catalogue in 

 order to prevent duplication of work. This would not only lead to 

 economy of labor, but would provide scientific workers with a com- 

 plete and uniform reference to the literature of all sciences. Much 

 is yet to be done in order to completely carry out the intent of the 

 convention, and it can not be too strongly urged that as soon as war 

 conditions allow the complete activities of the Catalogue to be re- 

 sumed every effort be made to obtain such cooperation. 



Not only is it strongly advisable to consolidate and cooperate 

 with the publishers of scientific bibliographies, but also to so broaden 

 the scope of the Catalogue as to include many of the technical in- 

 dustries whose investigations and methods of production are so 

 closely allied with the progress of research in pure science as to 

 render it practically impossible to draw a line of demarcation be- 

 tween pure science and many of the applied sciences. 



Many difficulties have arisen to interfere with the work of this 

 Regional Bureau, not only in having the classification properly done, 



