become a means of materially increasing and improving the volume and quality of their commercial operations. If any one doubts the truth of the assertion above made, as to the general indifference towards technical literature of manufacturers, workmen, and merchants, he, or she, has only to take stock of the technical books contained in the nearest shop or warehouse, to be convinced that literature plays but a small part in British trade or commerce.
The workshop library, generally speaking, consists of various price-lists and manufacturers' catalogues, with, perhaps, a ready-reckoner and a few tables of rules and formulæ. Many workshops do not even possess the price-lists, and all kinds of processes are accomplished by rule-of-thumb, in the good old way sanctioned by the traditions of a long series of venerated great-great-grandfathers. Methods and recipes are used which are simply handed down from workman to workman, which have never been properly recorded for reference, and never, therefore, compared with similar, and perhaps more economical and effective processes. Some workshops of the largest kind do possess valuable and fully-equipped reference libraries of technical books, but they are very often locked up in the office for the sole benefit of the manager and foremen. In most factories, very little in the way of technical books will be found, save a few volumes of patterns or trade catalogues; and it must be confessed that, from libraries in hotels and shops to those in light-
