that members should draw the attention of the Chief Librarian to articles in periodicals which in their opinion ought to be preserved, so that these might be filed. A number of members promised to look through their own trade periodicals, mark the important ones. (i.e., those adding to the existing information on the subject), and hand them to the Libraries, in the assurance that these would be classified and filed, and so be permanently at their immediate disposal on request.

3.-TRADE DIRECTORIES.- -The Chief Librarian desired information as to the desirability of providing directories of individual trades; for example, the "Directory of Grocers," of "Watchmakers," etc. It was agreed that such directories, if they were bona fide, and not merely those in which traders' names were included in return for a payment, might be very useful; and the Chief Librarian was asked to circulate a list of such directories with these notes, and to request each member to express his view as to the possible usefulness to himself and his trade colleagues of the named directory of his own trade.

4.-ADVERTISING THE LIBRARY.-In order to advertise the facilities it was suggested: (1) that a notice calling attention to the Libraries be placed in the Chamber of Commerce Room; (2) that paragraphs be inserted in the trade journals; (3) that other trade organisations in Croydon be circulated upon the matter; and (4) each member was.asked to make the work known to his staff. 5. VISITS TO THE LIBRARY.-Members were asked to advise the Chief Librarian as to the days and hours at which he might ring them up when he required their help; and the Chief Librarian stated that he would welcome visits from members at the Central Library on any morning (except Monday) between 10 and 1, and at any other times by appointment.

6. MEETINGS.-It was agreed that it was unnecessary for the Committee to meet often; and that the best service would be rendered by the individual efforts of members who placed themselves in touch with the Libraries, drew attention to important new literature on their trades, and generally helped to keep the whole collection effective and up-to-date.

I do not claim anything novel in connection with this Committee. If it has any value it lies in the fact that the business men are asked to take a personal interest in the Libraries. The members admit frankly that the contact they have gained with the Libraries has been a revelation to them, and the Chamber of Commerce has elected the Chief Librarian a member in the belief that a close connection with the Libraries will be advantageous to business men. It has always seemed to me that the haphazard filing of information chosen by a librarian from a multiplicity of periodicals is likely to produce a huge file and not much information that the community actually needs. If we can get the community to make the file for us it is probable that we shall get what is wanted. One of the hopeful signs in business life in this country is the growing vogue of the Rotary Club. I feel sure that the librarian

in each town should be a member. It is unnecessary, I presume, to say that the Rotary Club consists of business men, only one of whom is drawn from each branch of industry, who meet once a month, lunch together, and discuss business and social problems from the point of view involved in their motto, "Service not Self." Such a club affords obvious opportunities for valuable service to the librarian. I am delighted to see that in many towns librarians have addressed their Rotary Clubs on libraries in some way or other. These are a few things that can be done without great difficulty, although they involve time and effort. It is quite clear to me that the librarian must become more and more an active agent in his town.

LETTERS ON OUR AFFAIRS.

DEAR ERATOSTHENES,

When the dramatist begins to concern himself with libraries, the poor librarian must needs turn to the drama. In other words, Mr. Bernard Shaw has been illuminating the columns of our learned contemporary, The Librarian, with the scintillations of his paradoxical wit, and so this month we blossom forth with a little playlet, intelligible to those who have read Mr. Shaw, and entitled

HEADACHE HALL.

(Copyright in the United States, Patagonia, and the Free State of Ireland.)

Time.-Evening.

Scene. The entrance to Headache Hall; a small room occupied by a bored-looking middle-aged man who is playing patienceneedless to say, he is the assistant. In a while his game is interrupted by the entrance, through the heavy baize-covered doors on one side of the room, of a meek, very insignificant little fellow, who is not even fashionably dressed. As the door opens, the sound is heard of ribald laughter, cursing and wrangling, which noise the assistant rushes to shut out by closing the doors behind the visitor. His bearing towards the meek man is charged with deep respect. ASSISTANT: Good evening, sir.

(The meek man acknowledges the greeting and advances to the baize doors in the front.)

ASSISTANT: Allow me, sir.

He pushes open the doors and holds them open to allow the meek man to pass through--and to allow us a glimpse of the interior of Headache Hall, a large, lofty, timbered room, the decoration of which is severely medieval, from the stained glass windows and the locked glass-fronted bookcases to the hard uncomfortable forms on one of which, at the far end of the room, almost lost in the dim hazy light, is seated a solitary student. But before we can see more the assistant has closed the sound-proof doors behind the meek man, and resumed his game. In a few seconds, however, his attention is attracted by the advent through the side doors of a recurrence of the ribald row, and also of a tall, obviously purposely ill-dressed, dirty youth carrying a large portfolio.

THE YOUTH WITH THE PORTFOLIO: Good evening. Here I am, you see. (Puts down the burden of his profession)

ASSISTANT: Yes, I see-but it's no good. You can't come in tonight.

YOUTH That is rotten. Are you sure?

ASSISTANT: Certain. The Hall's full.

YOUTH It's always full. Look here, I'm beginning to doubt you (he pushes open the middle doors before the assistant is aware of his intention).

ASSISTANT: Heigh! You can't go in I tell you. You mustn't disturb them.

YOUTH But there's no one there

ASSISTANT: Yes, there is.

YOUTH Well-only two.

ASSISTANT: And two's sufficient.

A crowded library is an

absurdity—like a crowded laboratory or observatory.

YOUTH Three isn't a crowd.

ASSISTANT: Three! Why, my boy, the introduction of the third might have an incalculable effect upon the destiny of the world. The studies of those two men must not be disturbed at any cost. YOUTH But what about my studies?

ASSISTANT: Your studies?

YOUTH Yes. Don't you realise that I'm to be the Rembrandt of the twentieth century?

ASSISTANT: What about that?

YOUTH What about it? Haven't I to have a chance? Hasn't art to have a chance?

ASSISTANT: Art! What's art got to do with it? There's something more important in the world than art, I should think. Do you know who's in there now ?

YOUTH: No. Pasteur and Abraham Lincoln ?

ASSISTANT: No. Come off it. I'll tell you. The man at the far end (his voice sinks to a reverential whisper) is to be the Bertram Shore of the future. Fancy! In eight years time-he's only just started he'll have gathered together all the accumulated wisdom of the centuries and then you'll see. Not before. It would be dangerous to uncork such an intellect until all the sediment had settled down. But then-oh, the difference to me, to you, to all the-to be excessively cautious-millions of those general readers of moderate means, but not of excessive caution, who will share his books as they share a towel on a rolling pin.

YOUTH (not convinced): And the other bloke?

ASSISTANT: Ah! The other gentleman-is even more worth while. YOUTH Indeed!

ASSISTANT: Yes. He's getting up a revolution.

YOUTH A revolution!

ASSISTANT: Yes. It's a ticklish job, is that. It'll take quite ten years ten years of hard uninterrupted reading. And you ask me to let you in.

YOUTH But what's he reading all that time?

ASSISTANT: Oh, lots of things-Henty, Don Quixote, The Bible, Elinor Glyn, and of course-"Wheels." Yes, it takes a lot of thought. It has to be turned round in your mind so often, YOUTH But that's damned hard lines on me.

you see.

ASSISTANT: Can't be helped, anyhow. You wouldn't like to rob the world of a masterpiece like "Up from Noah," and a real good massacre of the capitalists, just for the sake of a few daubs, would you?

YOUTH Oh, well. I'll go to a concert instead.

ASSISTANT (with a smile of superior knowledge): You won't. YOUTH No?

ASSISTANT: No. Because the concert hall's occupied by the future Beethoven, and no one can be allowed to disturb him.

YOUTH But, I say. How do you know that this bloke that's monopolising the concert and these other blokes that are monopolising this Hall are going to turn out as you say?

ASSISTANT: We don't. It has to be left to chance. Do you know that we've trained twenty-five potential Trotskys since the Hall was founded, and nothing has happened yet.

YOUTH Well, I'm going to the pictures, anyway.

ASSISTANT: You can't.

YOUTH Then-damn it-I'll have to go and commit suicide. Good Night. (He opens the door and the noise is heard once more.) say. What the hell's wrong downstairs?

I

ASSISTANT: Oh, nothing. It's always going on. Different lots, you know. They come here to sit round the fire and read smutty stories, and generally to enjoy themselves. Tonight it's the Sunday School League.

YOUTH Sunday School League!

ASSISTANT: Yes. And tomorrow it's the Town Council.
YOUTH But why?

ASSISTANT: Oh, they come here to discharge their evil impulses without hurting anyone to waste their criminal propensities harmlessly through the imagination, so that after a debauch of Moll Flanders and Cartouche, and so on, they can go out and do good until they feel wicked again, and so on. That, I might tell you, is the true function of the reading room-quite a different place from the hall proper. It used also to be the sleeping room, but we found that the sublimination of evil impulses clashed with somnolence, and so we fitted up a special dormitory with doors like this.

(As he mentions the doors they open and a moderately dressed, moderately intelligent man enters. The youth slips out as the average man walks across to the centre doors. The assistant rushes to stop him).

ASSISTANT: What do you want here?

AVERAGE MAN: What do you think I want ?

ASSISTANT: You can't go in there.

AVERAGE MAN: Why not, pray?

ASSISTANT: That room is not for you.

AVERAGE MAN: Indeed! And why not, eh?

ASSISTANT: Well--judging by appearances, I don't expect that you flatter yourself that you are a future Chekov or Selfridge, eh? AVERAGE MAN: I'll tell you what I am—and not so much of your impertinence. I'm a ratepayer.

ASSISTANT: A what?

AVERAGE MAN: A ratepayer-and I'll tell you what I want here. I want to borrow books on all the main subjects that every man who wishes to keep in touch with the world must read, and I want to borrow novels, poetry, and plays for myself, my wife and my family they'll mean many an hour of peaceful enjoyment for us And I want music, too. Then my children will want books to help them in their studies and in their work, and yet again I want to be able to come here whenever I have need to obtain any definite piece of information, and when I want to look at the current scientific and technical journals and the reviews. That's what I want. ASSISTANT: You won't find it here

AVERAGE MAN: Why not? I'm a ratepayer.
ASSISTANT: Can't help that.

AVERAGE MAN: Can't you? I'll soon see about that. I pay for all this and I expect what I want to be provided. My idea of a libraryASSISTANT: Of a library?

AVERAGE MAN: Yes. What else?

ASSISTANT: Oh, I see.

library. It's Headache

You want to go next door. This isn't a

Hall.

Curtain.

Hoping I haven't bored you, I am yours,

ARISTONYMOUS.

[The Editor does not hold himself responsible for the opinions of the writers of "LETTERS ON OUR AFFAIRS."]

LIBRARY NEWS.

[Readers are invited to send us items of news for this column. Brief notes on innovations, interesting happenings, appointments, and changes, and other local items of general interest are particularly welcome.]

At the NORWICH Public Library on Thursday evening, November 24th, Mr. W. T. F. Jarrold, the president of the Norwich and District Master Printers' Association, held a reception with the view of developing technical education among the employees in the printing trade in Norwich. The special collection of books on printing and kindred subjects which had been formed at the Library were arranged for convenience in the Junior Library, where they could easily be seen and examined. To add to the interest of the meeting the City Librarian (Mr. Geo. A. Stephen) arranged an exhibition, consisting of some rare early English printed books belonging to the old City library, some facsimiles of early printed books in the British Museum, and specimens of decorative book-covers, titlepages, and end-papers by artists of repute from Mr. Stephen's own collection. Each person was presented with a copy of the descriptive and annotated catalogue of the books on printing, etc., compiled