the nursery and of zealous housewives anxious to get rid of rubbish. Herein we moderns are something wiser than Sir Thomas Bodley, who would have no "riff-raff" at Oxford, or the founders of the University Library of Gottingen, who proceeded "mit moglicher Vorbeilassung der gemeinen und gewohnlichen Handbiicher." Curiously enough, this library even at the present day possesses and exercises the power of sending back or refusing to take in printed matter sent under the Copyright Act which is "unsuitable for preservation and incorpo- ration with the collections." It is equally careful as to the character of the donations it accepts.[1]
It would be a magnificent project to make the British Museum not merely national, but imperial in its copyright privileges, but this is as yet far from being realised. Those portions of the Empire where the influence of London is predominant now furnish supplies of their literary produce, but the self-governing colonies are by no means unanimous.
Since 1890 the quarterly lists of new books published by the Indian Government (and the British Protectorates in India) are sent to the Museum, where a selection is made by the officials of the Oriental department of what seems most important or interesting. This selection forms a small proportion of the actual output, which is much larger than might be supposed, owing to the extensive publication of school-books. From Canada since July 1895 a complete collection has been sent each quarter of the literary
- ↑ Reglement vom 23. August 1884.
