Of the seven employees in the Library (on my rolls) eligible under the act, no less than six have been certified for retention; and the certification has been accepted and approved by the Civil Service Commission. With one exception the six employees hold subordinate positions not involving either great physical strain nor initiative; but each represents in his position an accumulated experience which could not be replaced by a new appointee at the existing salaries-so that on the whole the Government profits by his retention. Yet the ages reach as high as-in one exceptional case-80 years.

The investigation, the decision, and the proportion of those retained under it are a commentary upon the frequent (and inconsiderate) assertion that the Government service is overincumbered with valetudinarians who are not earning their salaries. Unless one or two Government establishments be exceptions, I believe that the Federal service includes no more such people than any large private corporation operated with fair consideration for its employees.

The one employee in the Library (of the seven entitled) Arthur Crisfield who actually retires is Arthur Crisfield, the Assistant Register of Copyrights. The report of the Register (infra) contains a reference to and appreciation of him which I heartily adopt. A devoted public servant, whose breeding equaled his efficiency. The quality of such a man, his spirit in relation to his work, to his associates, and to the public are an example and a lesson to the service, and a rebuke to those who consider the Government employee as a selfish bureaucrat concerned only to hold his job with the minimum of effort.

Notable the service losses of the Reading Room was among the death on January 29, 1920, after a few days illness, of Lawrence Washington, for many years Custodian of the Representatives reading room. "His wide acquaintance with Congress, his more than 22 years experience in this

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Library, his unfailing courtesy, good judgment and tact, his unwearied interest in the needs of those he served, combined to make his loss irreparable."

In recognition of his worth Congress had, six months before, added a third to the quite inadequate salary of the position. There was every prospect that he would live for many years to give highly effective service. He was accorded the very unusual honor of a special tribute in the proceedings of the House of Representatives on February 23, 1920, as a part of the birthday honors paid by the House to President Washington. Lawrence Washington was the great great grandson of George Washington's younger brother, John Augustine Washington. He was born at Mount Vernon on January 14, 1854, in the room in which General Washington died.

Two other Reading Room assistants died during the year: Miss Eliza Logie, who had served efficiently as a deck attendant since 1897, and Fred Fowler, the faithful old doorkeeper who had been in the Library service for 43 years.

A further loss to the service by death was that of Miss Marguerite C. Wright, a valued assistant in the Catalogue Division.

The resignation of James D. Thompson (in September, 1919) left the Legislative Reference Division without a chief. During the remainder of the fiscal year the responsibility of the division was divided between Gilbert Hirsch (previously his chief assistant and on his resignation designated also Law Librarian), Charles W. Collins, jr. (Administrative Assistant), and Walter H. McClenon. In June (1920) Dr. Hirsch in turn resigned, and Mr. Collins has for the time being succeeded to the Law Librarianship with general supervision of the division also. [See also Appendix VI of this Report.]

The need of additional shelving is reemphasized in the report of the Superintendent of the Reading Room, from which again I quote:

"The question of additional shelf space, considered at some length in my last year's report, calls with increasing stress for some definite steps toward relief. It was said a year ago that 'as soon as ocean transportation regains its norm we shall be heavily taxed to shelve the inevitably great increases.' Transportation is far from normal, but the intervening year has seen over 120,000 volumes added to the Library, a mass of material considerably above the average annual increase of the five years immediately preceding the war (1910– 1914), and exceeded but twice in the entire history of the Library. Ever greater increases in the years just before us are scarcely to be escaped, and should not be avoided.

"The collection of books, now numbering in excess of 2,830,000 and growing at the rate of more than 10,000 volumes per month, has for more than a year been crowding the available space in several classes of literature. This has made necessary a resort to many undesirable makeshifts. In many places groups of related material have had to be broken up and shelved in widely separated parts of the building; in many other places books have had to be shelved behind other books on the same shelves. These conditions will grow worse at a rapidly increasing rate as new material comes in.

"To relieve the situation somewhat, a systematic elimination of such duplicate copies as can be spared has been begun in certain classes of literature, but only comparatively slight relief can be expected in this direction. The service cost of elimination is almost or quite as great as the service cost of accession. In most cases there must be a preliminary search to account for all available copies; next a careful balancing of the probabilities of future needs, requiring long experience and good judgment; finally careful alterations of numerous records (catalogues, deck indexes, shelf lists). The process of elimination is therefore slow. In those classes of literature in greatest use (and these are also the classes in which, as a rule, book production is greatest) additional copies are always needed.

"A possible alternative is the elimination of all copies of obsolete material, so called. But the difficulties in this direction are even greater and the results more dubious. The mechanical processes involved are the same, but the possession of the power to determine what titles can safely be rejected as wholly superfluous in a library of encyclopedic scope is not claimed by many librarians.

"Lord Rosebery, burdened by no responsibilities in such matters, may briefly consign to destruction 'bales of forgotten science, superseded history, biographies of people that nobody cares about,' or Mr. Edmund Gosse refer to large collections as 'gigantic masses of rubbish,' a public incentive 'to give up reading'; but these are not the verdicts of experienced keepers of books. Too often for the approval of such wholesale indictments has to-day's folly proved to be to-morrow's wisdom. Too often have generations of readers approved what their predecessors neglected or despised. A great library is bound to preserve for its readers, present and to come, many books which a majority vote of its readers, at any particular time or even at all times, might condemn.

"In my own search of the shelves for material appropriate for rejection I recently came upon a large block of paper-covered volumes of fiction issued many years ago from a single press no longer in existence. These little books, occupying numerous shelves, were in their own day anathema to the critics; they never reached the dignity of mention in the manuals of literature; their vogue vanished long ago. They seemed to deserve no permanent place on library shelves and they were noted to be early recommended for disposal. within a few months another collection of these identical titles was sold at an American auction at prices ranging as high as $20 each for single volumes that originally sold for a dime. Commercial values in the book trade are unsatisfactory tests of library utilities, but they at least serve as good ground for 'continuing the case' of books accused of uselessly cumbering the shelf."

But

William Adams Slade (formerly Chief of the Periodical Division) has now been assigned definitely to the conduct of the Order Division in succession to Mr. Koch, who resigned September, 1919. The Periodical Division is for the present in charge of Yale O. Millington, for some years chief assistant in the Division of Bibliography.

A serious loss, and one typical of what is to be expected should no remedy be applied to the existing conditions, is the resignation of Dr. G. M. Churchill, one of the major experts in classification. He goes to the teaching staff of the George Washington university. No replacement is possible of the judgment and experience which he takes from us.

Nor is it possible of the judgment and experience of Mr. Willard O. Waters, of the Catalogue Division, who leaves. us to join the staff of the Henry E. Huntington Library. [See report of the Chief Cataloguer, infra.]

To the position vacated by the death of Lawrence Washington I have assigned Hugh A. Morrison, one of the two chief assistants in the Reading Room service, and for 30 years an assiduous, competent, and valued member of that staff. The promotion was only just to him, but it means a serious loss to the main Reading Room.

FINANCE

The following table exhibits the appropriations and expenditures of the Library proper and of the Copyright Office for the fiscal year, and the appropriations for the preceding fiscal year and the year now current. Included also are the appropriations for the equipment and care of the building and grounds, expended by the Superintendent.