THE GLOBE. FRIDAY, DECEMBER 23, 1881. THE PUBLIC LIBRARY.

Globe, Volume XXIII, Issue 2408, 23 December 1881, Page 3

THE GLOBE. FRIDAY, DECEMBER 23, 1881. THE PUBLIC LIBRARY.

The discussion at tho mooting of tho Board of Governors, held yesterday, cannot fail to in ereat the general public. There cannot be any doubt as to tho necessity of a circulating library for supplying tho public with general literature; the only question is as to tho manner in which it should be managed, and as to the way in which the funds necessary for its support should bo supplied. Now Mr. Feroclay has raised the question as to the legality of expending money arising from tho reserves of the Canterbury Museum, Library, and School of Technical Science, on tho Libraty, as far as relates to the circulating department and reading-room. By implication he avers that considerable sums of money have been spent in this way, and he objects to the process. Dr. Turnbull, on the other hand, declares that during the last eight years only £428 has in reality been spent on the whole Library. He says that during that period the total expenditure has amounted to £13,473, the income being £11,354, leaving an apparent deficit of £2120. But there has to be deducted from this tho sura of £1692, to which amount the College itself is actually in debt to the Circulating Library, so that the upshot of tho matter is that the College has only spent £428 in tho direction indicated. All this is, of course, a matter of account, and it is impossible to judge of the rights of the case until tho returns promised have been furnished. If Dr. Turnbull is right, Mr. Foro Jay’s case at once falls to the ground ; if he is wrong Mr. Fereday has sound grounds for bringing his motion before the Board. It seems, however, strange that with tho ample materials which Dr. Turnbull declares exist for learning all particulars as to the disposal of the funds in connection with the Library, there should be any doubt as to tho way in which tho matter in reality lies. We may be allowed to doubt if the accounts respecting the funds arising from the reserves of the Canterbury Museum, Library and School of Technical Science are kept sufficiently apart, when on the one hand wo find one of the Governors declaring that large sums are being expended out of them in an illegal direction, and on the other hand we find another Governor asserting that tho funds are in debt to the Circulating Department to the tune of £1692. However, this part of tho business will, no doubt, be amply ventilated at the Board’s next meeting at the end of January. We now propose to treat generally of the position of the Circulating Library and Reading Room with regard to the public.

It appears necessary in all such matters to take things as we find them, and not to lay down a hard and fast rule to which everything is to be referred. In Melbourne and, on a smaller scale, in other towns we find public libraries existing which are purely reference libraries open to the public. These towns leave circulating libraries to be managed by private enterprise; or, at all events, where grants of public money are given in aid of circulating libraries, they are managed by a committee of subscribers. Our present Circulating Library has grown in its present form mainly from the fact that the Literary Institute which formerly existed here was not a success, and that it was found advisable to hand its plant over to a body which could manage it more to the benefit of the public at large. Now if there is any intention on the part of the Board of Governors to cut the Circulating Department adrift, it will certainly lie with them to provide a scheme by which the public may bo served with good and useful literature. Having once undertaken the task, they must either “ see it through,” or provide the public with a definite and feasible scheme. One thing is certain—namely, that the public will not allow itself to be starved intellectually. The public, wo take it, are not wedded to one plan more than another, but it must have books to read by the fireside, and everybody is quite prepared to pay a moderate subscription for the privilege of obtaining them, seeing that books cost money. If Mr. Foreday is right in his implied facts, and sums are going out of the College funds to aid the Circulating Library, it will have to be remembered that the process has been going on during the last eight years, and that the public would have every right to growl if, in a fit of tardy repentance, the Board were to practically throw over the Circulating Department without providing some other adequate scheme.

As to any suspicion that the Board are at all likely to think the care of supplying the public with works of fiction below their dignity, on this point we think that they may he completely exonerated. They are a body of sensible men, and the large majority of them probably quite recognise, for instance, that the sacrifice of one of George Eliot’s novels would bo a greater loss to the world than that of Smith’s learned monograph on some particular bivalve. The provision of healthy literature for the public is evidently beneath the dignity of no intelligent body of men. The Board of Governors have put their hand to the plough, and, as wo said before, they will either have to see it through ” or propound some feasible scheme. One thing weald seem apparent —namely, that if the subscribers had some say in the management of the circulating department, much heart-burning might bo avoided. They would then feel that their wants and wishes had a mouth-piece. They would also, through their delegates, see the difficulties under which the institution labored, and this would act as a buffer between the Board and the subscribers.

While the Board are about cleaning up their premises generally, we trust they will turn their attention to one or two minor points. The reading-room, for instance, is not one of which Christchurch can be proud, either in the accommodation or comfort afforded. Again, aa we have several times urged, there seems no possible reason why the reference library should be closed an hour earlier than the reading-room. Most people can only use it in the evening, and to shut it up at nine renders it almost a sealed room to a largo number of individuals who would otherwise gladly spend their evenings there to great profit to themselves.