THE ROYAL SOCIETY AND THE STATE 



labour has been given gratuitously and without stint by 

 Fellows during the past forty years, will be carried down 

 to the close of the century, and will consist of two parts : 

 an Authors' Catalogue, and a Catalogue of Subjects. 

 Encouraged by a donation from Mr. Andrew Carnegie, 

 and the noble liberality of Dr. Ludwig Mond and other 

 Fellows, the Council decided to proceed with the com- 

 pletion of the Catalogue, in the hope of further donations 

 from Fellows and others as the work advances. 



It was obvious that to continue permanently to prepare 

 and publish catalogues of the rapidly increasing output 

 of scientific literature would be wholly beyond the means 

 of any one Society, and was an undertaking so vast as to 

 require organised international co-operation for success. In 

 1893, a letter, signed by seventeen Fellows, was addressed 

 to the President, asking that steps might be taken to 

 provide for the continuation of the Society's Catalogue 

 from the beginning of the century by adequate international 

 co-operation. A Committee was appointed, which reported 

 in favour of an international conference on the subject. 

 Three conferences were held successively in 1896, 1898, 

 and 1900. It is scarcely possible to convey an adequate 

 conception of the arduous and prolonged labours of these 

 conferences, and of the numerous meetings of committees 

 held in connection with them. The Society may well 

 feel great satisfaction that a work of such magnitude, and 

 of so great moment to all scientfic workers, which was 



initiated by itself, was taken up with such remarkable 



78 



