PROCEEDINGS FOR 1895 XXV 
for modern culture when one of the most popular novels is ‘ Dodo,” which 
shows very little literary skill and simply exposes the intense frivolity 
and utter heartlessness of an English woman of fashion, assuredly not 
among the characteristics of English mothers, whose sons have made 
England great, and whose daughters have elevated her virtue. 
However, whilst no doubt the mass of light literature is wretched in 
the extreme, it is consoling to think that we have * Marcella” and “The 
Manxman ” to prove that powerful conceptions of human life have not 
yet entirely disappeared since the days when there were giants indeed in 
the world of letters. 
If Dickens and Thackeray had written nothing else than ‘ David 
Copperfield” and “The Tale of Two Cities,’ “The Newcomes” and 
“ Henry Esmond,” they would still merit the thanks of Englishmen and 
their readers the world over. As long, then, as we have the works of 
Walter Scott, Dickens, Thackeray, George Eliot, Ward, Stevenson, 
Oliphant and others of note, to delight and instruct the world, we need 
not fear the establishment of free libraries. After all, a free library is 
an inducement to men and women to spend their time more protitably 
than is possible in places where one does not exist. Light literature 
wearies after a while, and the mind must, in most cases, turn to the 
more invigorating and heaithy books that every well furnished library 
has on its shelves. 
13. LIBRARY CATALOGUES. 
We should like to see published ere long in convenient form, for the 
use of libraries and students generally, such a catalogue of the only 
national library Canada possesses—the parliamentary library at Ottawa— 
as has been recently printed by the Royal Colonial Institute, which has 
done such good service for the empire since its foundation in 1868, This 
handsome catalogue of its library cannot fail to be of much use to Eng- 
lishmen and the numerous persons in London who require information 
from time to time on colonial questions. It is compiled in such a manner 
as to show the full titles of the works upon each colony in the order of 
publication, together with an index of authors and contents, which makes 
it historical as well as illustrative in its character. The book is divided 
into sections, in which the literature of every colony is so arranged that 
the works upon any special subject connected with its history, govern- 
ment, trade and development may be followed from its foundation to 
the present time. For instance, if we wish for information upon a par- 
ticular subject, we need only refer to the headings on Colonial Botany 
and Flora, Imperial Federation, Emigration, Transactions of Societies, 
West Indies, Voyages and Circumnavigation, and so on. In order fur- 
ther to increase the utility of the catalogue for purposes of reference, the 
contents of all the chief collections of voyages, such as Hakluyt, Purchas, 
