280 The Library. Xtbrarp Iftotes ant> The Editor earnestly requests that librarians and others will send to him early and accurate information as to all local Library doings. The briefest record of facts and dates is all that is required. In course of time " Library Notes and News " -will become of the utmost value to the historian of the Public Library movement, and it is therefore of the highest importance that every paragraph should be vouched for by local knowledge. Brief written paragraphs are better than newspaper cuttings. ABERDEEN. The Lending Department of the Public Library was closed for a fortnight in July for the purposes of stock-taking, and to enable the staff to take their annual holiday all together at a time when the public generally were holiday-making. The innovation may be said to have proved a success. July is a month in which invariably the fewest issues occur, and accordingly the closing of the Department then caused little inconvenience to the public, while it was a boon to the staff, and from an administrative point of view an advantage to the Library. ABERYSTWYTH. In August, Miss M. A. Jenkins was appointed librarian and hall-keeper in the place of her late father, who had held those offices since March, 1886. AIRDRIE. On August 4, the new Free Public Library in Airdrie was formally opened by Bailie Connor, convener of the Library Committee, in place of Mr. Andrew Carnegie, the donor of 1,000, who was unable to be present. Bailie Connor was presented by Provost Arthur, architect of the building, with a silver key, with which he formally opened the door of the lending department. A cake and wine banquet was held in the museum room, at which Provost Arthur presided, when a life-size portrait of Mr. Thomas Jeffrey, painted by Mr. Ramsay Russell, Edinburgh, was presented in recognition of his services as honorary secretary of the library for the last 2 1 years. ARBROATH. A movement is on foot in this town with the object of having established a Free Public Library. A meeting was recently held of delegates from over thirty organisations of working people, and a Committee was appointed to obtain as much information as possible (previous to approaching the authorities on the matter) as to the working, cost of management, c., and generally the results of the adoption of the Libraries Act in towns of a similar size to Arbroath (23,000). ASHTON. As a means of encouraging those students and readers who wish to follow a course of reading in the higher branches of litera- ture, and with a view to diverting the tastes of those readers who have confined their reading exclusively to fiction, the Public Library Com- mittee have resolved to adopt the following recommendation of the librarian : That an extra ticket, stamped with a distinguishing mark, be issued to any borrower on filling up the usual application form, and that works of fiction be in no case issued on such tickets.
