XII.] A Librarian's Work. 263 



These details make up the sum of what is entered 

 on the body of the long card ; but in addition to all 

 this, the left-hand margin contains the date of recep- 

 tion of the book, the fund to which it is charged, or 

 the name of the donor, and the all-important " shelf- 

 mark," which shows where the book is to be found ; 

 while on the right-hand margin is written a concise 

 description of the appearance of the book {i.e. 5 vol., 

 green cloth "), and a note of its price. When all this 

 is finished, the book is regarded as catalogued, and is 

 sent, with its card in it, to the principal assistant 

 for revision. From the principal assistant it is passed 

 on to me, and it is the business of both of us to see 

 that all the details of the work have been done cor- 

 rectly. A pencil-note on the margin of the card 

 shows the class and sub-class to which the book is 

 to be assigned in the catalogue of subjects ; and then 

 the card is separated from the book. The book goes on 

 to its shelf, to be used by the public ; the card goes 

 back to some one of the assistants, to be "indexed." 

 In our library-slang, " indexing " means the writing 

 of the " red " and " blue" cards which answer to the 

 " long " card ; in other words, the entry of the title ^ 

 on the new alphabetical and subject-catalogues begun 



"^ The marginal portions of the long card are not transcribed in 

 indexing. 



