College and Research Libraries K. D. Metcalf's "Universities Libraries Face the Future" (Library Quarterly 22: 6-7). ". . . In our libraries we have a section of our universities that tends, year in and year out, in good times and bad, to increase in cost geometrically, while the rest of the institution grows arithmetically. It is obvious that this cannot go on without the library's taking an ever increasing percentage of our total re- sources. That, expressed in other terms means that . . . each year . . . professors will have to be dropped so that the money from their salaries can be spent for library pur- poses." The nub of the matter here is whether library costs increase geometrically while university resources increase arith- metically. If total library expenditures are by 1950 only 3.4 per cent of the total educational expenditures, such a process cannot have gone on for long. The experience of my own insti- tution, shown on the following table, does not indicate any such discrepancy between the growth of the library and the growth of the college as a whole. Each tended to double every decade until the depression and each has roughly doubled in twenty years since. Is the long run experience of other institutions dif- ferent? Dr. Millett concludes his book with a cautious optimism about the future support of higher education. Is there reason to be less optimistic about the future support of the libraries in this field? that costs have increased much more rapidly. Has this been true for a century or more? Have library costs in the past century in- creased more rapidly than general university expenditures? Has the increase in costs been equally distributed among the service branches, the technical processes, the cost of books and periodicals, or are there discrepancies among these parts of the library budget? How far are the increased costs a reflection of addi- tional services and a more adequate acquisition policy, and how far are they a reflection of higher salaries and higher book prices? If we can secure answers to such questions we would really begin to know something about the financial aspects of our college and uni- versity libraries. The figures may be impos- sible to obtain over very many years, but I hope some library school candidate will make the a t t e m p t . — W y l l i s E. Wright, Williams College Library. Lexikon des Buchwesens Lexikon des Buchwesens. Herausgegeben von Joachim Kirchner. Stuttgart, Hiersemann Verlag, 1952. Vol. I. 405 p. DM28.00. Libraries which were so unfortunate as not to have purchased the three volumes of the Lexikon des gesamten Buchwesens (i935~ I937) edited by Joachim Kirchner and the late Karl Loffler have had a difficult time lo- 1 9 0 2 1912. 1 9 2 2 J 9 3 2 J 9 4 2 x 9 5 2 T o t a l institutional expenditure $ 1 0 7 , 3 1 3 $ 2 2 5 , 1 5 9 $ 4 1 3 , 8 5 8 $ 8 2 5 , 0 2 0 $ 9 2 4 , 0 6 8 L i b r a r y expenditure 4 , 6 5 9 9 , 1 9 5 1 7 , 2 7 1 3 9 , 3 ° 7 5 1 , 2 0 6 Percentage 4 . 3 4 . 1 4 . 2 4 . 8 5 . 5 N u m b e r of students 390 533 587 809 873 L i b r a r y costs per student $ U - 9 5 $ 1 7 . 2 5 $ 2 9 . 4 2 $ 4 8 . 5 9 $ 5 8 . 6 6 The library is a minor part of the whole field of the financial aspects of higher educa- tion and one cannot criticise an author for writing his own book. Nevertheless, a study of the brief remarks on library finances raises many questions which need to be considered. The only statistics dealing with any consider- able number of libraries over an extended period of time with which I am acquainted are those which show the growth of book stock and indicate a widespread tendency to double every sixteen to twenty years. The figures given for two decades by Dr. Millett, as well as those cited from Williams, suggest eating a copy, and then only at a price of around $75.00. The answer to this problem has been provided in the form of a new edi- tion by Kirchner with a slight changed title and a somewhat more modest format. How- ever, the editor has undertaken such extensive textual revision that the term "second edition" seemed inapplicable, and accordingly he has even changed the title. While the present work contains sub- stantially the same information that is in the earlier one, the changes are obvious. For example, the articles on Chinese printing and book trade, Indian and Indonesian book trade 344 COLLEGE AND RESEARCH LIBRARIES are up-to-date as of October 1952. T h e bibli- ographies include books and articles published as late as 1 9 5 1 , although Kirchner does not seem to have access to complete files of all the more important American, English, and Scan- dinavian books and journals published in the field of the book arts during the last decade and a half. T h e articles on libraries and librarianship have been restricted to a few comprehensive historical surveys, and the articles on palaeog- raphy have been cut down considerably. Cer- tain other fields such as journalism, library architecture and administration, and history of writing have been eliminated. T h e many entries under cities in the Lexikon des gesam- ten Buchwesens have been largely eliminated and the information included in the articles under the names of countries and provinces (although there are no entries under any states of the American republics). Bibliographies, in general, are somewhat smaller; but in a work of this sort selection is the most important element in giving additional references. It is unfortunate that articles are not signed, but Kirchner states there are "important reasons" for omitting names of authors. T h e list of his collaborators in the preface is a sufficient guarantee of the reliability of the work. Kirchner has done very well by the world of the book in America and seems to have covered its most important aspects. His state- ment that the John Carter Brown Library is "in the University Library in Providence" (p. 1 1 0 ) is misleading, and the Huntington Library was not given to the State of Cali- fornia, (p. 3 3 7 ) . Kirchner is not always meticulously careful with his accents in such languages as Portuguese and Icelandic, and there are some misprints. For example, read Capella on p. 44 where the name Martianus Copella appears; 1820, not 1920, as the date of the founding of the University of Michigan (p. 18) ; and 1951, not 1 9 3 1 , as the date of publication of Dagher's directory of libraries in the Near East. Such criticism, however, is hardly justified from an English-speaking person. W e should reserve any critical comments until we have produced a work such as the Lexikon des Buchwesens or the great Nordisk Leksikon for Bogvaesen (now as f a r as " L i t o g r a f i " ) being published by the Nyt Nordisk Forlag Arnold Busck in Copenhagen. T h e second and concluding volume of the Lexikon des Buchwesens will be available later this year.—Lawrence S. Thompson, Uni- versity of Kentucky. Government Information Government Information and the Research Worker: Lectures delivered at a Vacation Course of the University of London School of Librarianship and Archives in April, 1951. Ed. with an Introduction by Ronald Stave- ley. B.A., F . L . A . London, Library Assoc., 1952. vi, 228p. 24s. For a long time the users of British govern- ment publications have found it easy to locate clearly written and accurate descriptions of Parliamentary Papers, Statutes, Gazettes, etc., but when it came to finding descriptions of the non-parliamentary publications of min- istries and other administrative bodies very little satisfactory material seemed to be availa- ble. Therefore this new book which is largely, though not exclusively, devoted to non-parlia- mentary publications should be welcomed by students, librarians and research workers. Though not a systematic manual nor complete in its coverage, it will answer many of the questions concerning the functions of govern- ment departments and the series they publish which naturally arise in the minds of readers and it makes an excellent addition to a small group of works1 which every general research library should contain. Five general lectures furnished an introduc- tion to this series. The first by E. M . Nichol- son, secretary, Office of the Lord President of the Council, was on " T h e Government and Research." In the second, D r . W . R. Francis of the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research described "the government agencies and departments in which scientific research is undertaken and sponsored." These first two lectures are not printed in this book because the information they contained is adequately treated in a 1951 Treasury publication en- titled Government Scientific Organization in the Civilian Field: a Review Prepared For the Lord President of the Council by the Advisory Council on Scientific Policy. T h e third of these preliminary lectures was on 1 E.g., Ford, Percy, and Ford, G. A Brcviate of Parliamentary Papers: 1917-1939. 1 9 5 1 ; Harrocks, Sidney. The State as a Publisher . . . 1952 (Li- brary Association Pamphlet no. 1 0 ) ; Temperley, Harold, and Pinson, Lilliam M. A Century of Diplomatic Blue Books: 1814-1914. 1938. JULY, 1953 345