112 Report of the President 



THE LIBRARY* 



Ralph W. Tower, Curator 



An annual report necessitates a review of the activities of a 

 twelvemonth; each year's growth depends directly upon the 

 achievements of the period preceding it. Assenting to such 

 premises, one is called upon to pardon the publication of a rather 

 general resume of the activities of the library in the place of 

 the more limited and specific annual report. 



History does not record, but circumstantial evidence indicates, 

 that when Professor Bickmore presented in 1869 a copy of his 

 own work : Reisen im Ostindischen Archipel in den Jahren 1865 

 und 1 8 66, translated from the English by J. E. A. Martin, 

 director of the university library at Jena, 1869, the American 

 Museum had received its first accession. This gift marks the 

 beginning of a library whose existence was specifically created 

 by the charter that incorporated the institution, and demonstrates 

 with what remarkable foresight and understanding the founders 

 planned the future of The American Museum of Natural His- 

 tory. Although the casual visitor to-day may perhaps be 

 surprised to learn that a library is maintained within the institu- 

 tion, anyone who reflects upon the matter will appreciate 

 immediately the imperative need for its existence, and its vital 

 connection with all the various phases of research and exhibition 

 for which the museum stands. In it may be found the writings 

 of those nature lovers of the past, who, like Walton, White, 

 Fabre and Burroughs, have furnished such delightful and liter- 

 ary descriptions of nature's workings, books which are still 

 an inspiration to the field naturalist of to-day. Here are as- 

 sembled a well-nigh complete collection of the more exact 

 scientific treatises of natural history, preserving as they do for 

 the present-day investigator and exhibitor the cumulative results 

 of previous discovery and research. In its files also are main- 

 tained the ever increasing records of the activities of the in- 

 numerable scientific organizations the world over, publications 

 amazing in their extent and prodigious in their importance. 



* Under the Department of Library and Publications. 



