252 



when the hot air escaped from the smoke pipe, its heat was 

 so far exhausted that it was not sufficient to char a shingle. 



Some discussion followed these papers, after which, se- 

 veral donations to the Institute library from Sir William 

 E. Logan, through Prof. Hall, were announced, when the 

 Institute adjourned. 



April 27, 1858. 

 The president, John V. L. Pruyn, in the chair. 



Joel Munsell read a paper on The Burning of Books. 

 He stated that the most prolific cause for the burning of 

 books had always been religious animosity. He gave some 

 account of the various great conflagrations of books, begin- 

 ning with that of the great Alexandrine library. Of books 

 burned from religious animosity, none had suffered so often 

 as the Bible, especially the English Bible. The ill directed 

 zeal of conquerors had often destroyed the early records of 

 the nations which they subdued. Examples of this he 

 mentioned in the destruction of the Irish records by the 

 English, and the Mexican records by the Spaniards. Of 

 accidental conflagrations, Mr. Munsell mentioned that of 

 the Royal library of Icelandic literature at Copenhagen, as 

 most to be deplored. The burning of books in early times 

 was a much more serious calamity than now, because by 

 the multiplication of books the destruction of a single 

 library was much less likely to exterminate any work, than 

 when copies were few and multiplied only at ruinous ex- 

 pense. In the early conflagrations, as for example of the 

 Alexandrine library, much must have perished which can 

 never be replaced, and which, if preserved, might have been 

 of inestimable value to the world. 



Dr. Vanderpoel in connection with this subject, mentioned 

 a conflagration of modern times, which he himself witnessed, 

 that of the burning of the library of Louis Phillipe in 1848, 

 by the Paris mob. It was an evidence that with all modern 

 civilization, vandalism had not been eradicated from the 

 hearts of men. 



