[262:1] Read at the Annual Meeting of the Library Association, held at Nottingham, September 1891.
[269:1] Since this was written, the engineers of the Board of Works have reported that the sliding-press system can be safely extended to the galleries, which more than doubles the estimate of increased space given on the preceding page.
ON THE PROVISION OF ADDITIONAL SPACE IN LIBRARIES[272:1]
The interesting paper[272:2] to which you have just listened may well serve as introductory to a somewhat fuller treatment on my part of the question of providing adequate space for future accessions of books, so immensely important for all libraries, but especially so for public libraries, and for these in the ratio of their probable extent and consequent usefulness. When I had an opportunity of describing the British Museum sliding-press to the Nottingham conference, I dwelt upon the utility of the invention in this point of view as much as upon the mechanism of the press itself; and as the point is one which cannot be too much insisted upon, I shall take this opportunity of returning to it. Before doing so, however, or mentioning any further contrivances for economising space that may have suggested themselves, I may be allowed to tender my personal acknowledgments to Mr. Mayhew for the ingenuity which he has evinced, and to say that I am very desirous that his invention should be brought into practical operation at the Museum as soon as possible. We ought, I think, to exemplify every useful device both in press construction and other departments of library work that we may have the good fortune to introduce, both for our own credit and for the advantage of other libraries which may be disposed to inquire into our methods. I hardly expect that the pivot-press will replace the sliding-press to any great extent at the Museum, because, as I have previously stated, although the designers of the larger portion of our library had not the most remote conception of the sliding-press, they could not have provided for it more effectively if they had foreseen and contemplated its introduction. But, when the need for procuring additional space by mechanical contrivance makes itself felt, as must inevitably be the case one day in all really important libraries, difficulties will be found in the introduction of the sliding-press which will not exist in the case of the pivot-press. Unless expressly so designed, libraries will seldom be provided, as the Museum was, with a grated ceiling from which the sliding-press can be suspended without more ado, and the construction of such a ceiling is a formidable and expensive piece of work. This difficulty may indeed be overcome by making the sliding-press run upon the ground, as at Bethnal Green and the basement of the Museum, but this throws the entire weight upon the floor, which, though unobjectionable on a basement, may be dangerous in upper storeys. I am inclined to believe, therefore, that the pivot-press may be used with excellent effect in many instances, especially from its simplicity and ease of construction, when a sudden need arises for the accommodation of a new accession of books. I may further draw attention to a special merit—its singular lightness even when full of volumes. A child can work it with ease, unlike the sliding-press, which, when quite full, may tax the strength of a powerful man.