APPENDIX 6. 



REPORT ON THE INTERNATIONAL CATALOGUE OF 

 SCIENTIFIC LITERATURE. 



Sir : I have the honor to submit the following report on the opera- 

 tions of the United States Bureau of the International Catalogue of 

 Scientific Literature for the fiscal year ending June 30, 1920. 



At the beginning of the war six volumes of the eleventh issue were 

 still to be published, and only one volume of the twelfth issue had 

 appeared. 



In spite of the evident financial difficulty ahead of the Catalogue, 

 the Royal Society decided that publication should be continued 

 through the fourteenth issue, covering the year 1914. The deficit 

 has since been met by generous contributions from the Royal Society, 

 the Carnegie Corporation of New York, and other sources. All of 

 the volumes of the thirteenth and fourteenth issues have now been 

 published excepting those for Geology and Physiology of the four- 

 teenth issue, which are both in advanced stages of preparation. 

 Much of the material for the fifteenth and later issues is now in the 

 hands of the Central Bureau awaiting only authority for its publi- 

 cation. 



On account of the general upheaval felt among all international 

 oro-anizations as soon as war began, it became impossible for the 

 International Catalogue to continue its work in the satisfactory 

 manner which up to that time had characterized the enterprise. A 

 Ijrief review of the history and aims of the International organi- 

 zation may be repeated in order that the future aims and plans may 

 be better understood. 



When the publication was begun in 1901 it was for the purpose of 

 satisfying a recognized demand for a complete authors' and subject 

 index of all current scientific literature. This demand was to be met 

 by publishing in annual volumes, one for each recognized branch of 

 pure science, a complete authors' and subject index to its current liter- 

 ature. Each branch of science was to be covered by volumes contain- 

 incr complete citations of the author, title and source of every original 

 paper, comprising first an authors' index and second a classified sub- 

 ject index so arranged by means of classification schedules that the 

 literature on any subject in any of the sciences might be readily 

 found. The schedules were issued prior to the publication of the first 

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