To the Chairman and Members of the Derby Free 
Library and Museum Committee. 
GENTLEMEN, 
I have the honour to lay before you my Ninth Annual Report, 
and perhaps I might be permitted at the outset to make a few comparisons 
between the Stock and issues at the time of my appointment, and those 
it is my pleasure to lay before you for the year just closed. 
LIBRARY STOCK. ISSUES. 
LENDING. REFERENCE, TOTAL. DAILY. 
AAA! ee") (05,020 2" s.t FOsa Wie” ESTo04 .leee nae 
RO tee ste a NGS ee AES ST Net RG RORT ¢.c OO 
These figures speak for themselves. We have now 7,216 more books, 
the year’s issues are nearly 44,000 more, and there is an increase of 167 
in the daily issues. For the year just closed, the figures in the Lending 
Department show an increase of more than ten thousand issues over 
1892-3, and the daily issue is 45 higher. The Reference Department 
is slightly less than the preceding year, but that is accounted for by the 
fact that at the close of last year, during the progress of the Electric Light 
installation, there were several weeks, and that at the busiest time, when 
the Library was only in partial use during the evening. 
The number of new books added during the year has been 755 in 
the Lending Department, and 335 in the Reference, the latter including 
about two hundred volumes of Patent Specifications. The number of 
books withdrawn as worn out is 707, and of these 522 have been replaced, 
the remainder being books whose places have been declared vacant. 
Seven volumes have been lost and paid for, eight coming from infected 
houses have been destroyed, and four have been totally lost. I have to 
repeat the remark of former years, that on the whole, the books are very 
well used, and cases of wilful damage are rare, although we still suffer from 
acts of carelessness on the part of our borrowers. 
The Book Committee have paid special attention to the Scientific 
books in both Libraries, and works of great value and containing the 
newest information have been steadily added. Our percentage table 
shows an increase in every department of the Library except fiction, which 
shows a corresponding decrease. Juvenile books have been added largely 
of late years, and are much patronised, and I think that their separation 
