Capital of the district of Canterbury. Population, 30,715. Daily Papers.—"Lyttleton Times," "The Press," "The Evening Star," "The Telegraph."

Canterbury Public Library.

Howard Strong, Librarian.

The name of this library is rather misleading; for the benefit of my non-New Zealand readers, I must therefore explain that the library is under the control of the Board of Governors of Canterbury College, which is an affiliated branch of the University of New Zealand. It seems to me, therefore, that the proper name for this library is the "Canterbury College Public Library," though the most fitting title of all would be "The Free Public Library of Christ Church," for such to all intents and purposes it assuredly is, when all is said and done.

Bor the particulars which I am about to give relating to this library, I am indebted to Mr. F. G. Stedman, the Registrar of the College, and to Mr. Howard Strong, the Librarian of the Canterbury Public Library, when I visited it in 1884-85.

It appears that in the year 1870, a "Museum and Public Library Bill 'was passed in the Provincial Council of Canterbury, with the object of providing a suitable library for the province, in Christ Church. Unfortunately, though this Bill was passed, a Bill to provide for the endowment of page 27 the library was lost, and it was not until 1872 that a motion was carried, requesting the Superintendent of the Province to reserve 100,000 acres of pastoral land, as an endowment for the proposed institution.

On May 2nd, 1872, Mr. W. Rolleston, then the Superintendent, at the conclusion of his speech opening the proceedings of the Provincial Council, used the words—"The establishment of a free public library will be brought under your attention; private efforts have already been invited to raise a portion of the necessary funds. The benefits of such an institution are for all time, confined to no one class, to no particular locality, and to no one period in the history of a community as supplementing the educational institutions which you have so liberally endowed. I trust the proposal will have your favourable consideration." During the following session were passed, in accordance with this recommendation, the Canterbury College Ordinance 1873, and the Canterbury Museum and Library Ordinance Amendment Ordinance, 1873; by this last, all the powers vested in the Trustees created by the Bill of 1870, were transferred to the Board of Governors of Canterbury College, with whom the management of the library thus created has remained ever since.

Since 1873, the library has been maintained partly by grant from Canterbury College of £500, and partly by the subscriptions of persons wishing to take out books, and there have been occasional grants of small sums from Government. The building and books purchased by the grant from the College, as well as the books belonging to the Old Provincial Library, which arc in the library, belong absolutely to Canterbury College.

There is no need for me to go into the financial position of this institution, more than to say that it is not satisfactory, and that there is a dispute as to the endowments, which will, I hope, personally, be ended by Canterbury College eventually handing over the library, free from debt, to the authorities of the city of Christ Church who, by page 28 bringing it under the Public Libraries Act, could easily make it a credit to the city.

The present buildings are fairly convenient, and consist of two reading-rooms, and a large room containing the library, which is divided into two branches: I, the reference library; 2, the circulating library. There are also other rooms and offices. Subscribers to the Institution, who nominally have to be recommended by a Governor of the College, alone have the power of borrowing books; during 1884 there were 445 subscribers at £ 1, and 28,330 books were borrowed, and the library contained 9,143 volumes in the circulating branch, and 6,804 in the reference branch.

During 1883 £130 were expended on new books, £91 on newspapers, and £50 on binding and printing; the agents for the library in London are Messrs. Sampson Low & Co., who are authorised to send out boxes of new books to a certain amount each month. I understand that the grant from Canterbury College is applied strictly to the replenishing of the reference department of the library. Admission to this is obtained by persons in Christ Church on the authorization of a Governor, the person signing an undertaking to observe the rules.

It is painful to have to record, that either the Governors must be very careless in admitting unworthy people, or, that the people in Christ Church who undertake to observe the rules, must be unusually forgetful of their undertakings. Otherwise it is hard to account for the shamefully large list of books stolen from, or damaged, in the reference library during the last two and a-half years. This is, I believe, the only so-called free library in Australasia, to which admission orders have to be obtained, and it is the only free library in Australasia which has suffered severely at the hands of the persons thus admitted. The only remedies which seem to me possible, are, to increase the staff of attendants—now much too small—and to do away with admission orders once and for ever; put the readers on page 29 their honour without these formalities and undertakings, and the books will take care of themselves.

The circulating department is not free from faults; subscribers are permitted to have access to the shelves, and are allowed to use the library as a reading-room. But worse than this, between the hours of twelve and two, this part of the library is usually invaded by a host of boys who stand reading at the shelves, many of these boys are neither subscribers nor the sons of subscribers, hut the librarian has no power to remove them. It also frequently occurs that subscribers come in and ask for a book, which is not to be found on the shelf, but it is really in the library, being read by some person who has no right to be in the library at all. One day when I visited the library seven persons were pointed out in it who were non-subscribers. The evils of a semi-free public library, such as this is, are painfully apparent, and it is much to be hoped that they may soon be remedied, and that so may be removed the only one blot which clings to the fair fame of Christ Church, to my mind the most charming of all New Zealand cities.

The circulating library is open daily from 10 a.m. to 9 p.m. except Sundays, Christmas Day, Good Friday, and general holidays. The reference library and reading-rooms are open also on Sundays, between the hours of 2 and 5, and 7 and 9 p.m. It is found that there is an average of about twelve persons availing themselves of the privilege of using the library on Sundays.

I have said a good deal about the weak points of the Canterbury Public Library, though I have not given nearly all the notes I made as to its shortcomings, I must now say a few words as to its good points. To begin with, the books arc arranged well in the library, the records of borrowings are well kept, the books for signatures of subscribers and visitors are also up to the mark, and there is a suggestion book which has been kept going since 1874. I do not recollect seeing in any library in New page 30 Zealand, and in but very few libraries at all, a book which for the most part contained such useful suggestions, many of which had commended themselves to the attention of the committee. Then lastly, as to the catalogues: that of the circulating department was printed in 1880, 8vo, pp. 121, xxxiv. It is a classified catalogue, with an index of author's names, and also a carefully compiled index of subjects. From it, it is apparent that there is a good deal of "fiction" in the library, but very little of what one may fitly call rubbish; travel, history, and biography make a fair show. Since 1880, the catalogue of the circulating department has been kept up in manuscript, under authors' names, and is kept on the librarian's table. The catalogue of the reference deparment was printed in 1879, 8vo, pp. 145, xi. It is a classified catalogue with an index of authors' names, and is a good piece of work. One at once gathers from it that there is a backbone of really valuable matter stored on the shelves, which makes one all the more anxious that it should be properly cared for and treated. There is a good collection of political works; Migne's Patrologia Grasca; fine set of the Anti-Nicene Fathers; the Chaucer and Early English Text Society's publications; the Art Journal; Ruskin's Works; Arber's reprints; and the Reports and Transactions, amongst others, of the British Association, Cambridge Philosophical Society, Linnean Society, and of the Society of Arts.

Such, roughly speaking, is the Canterbury Public Library, with a past full of struggles, a present, with many uncorrected abuses, but without any doubt a future of great usefulness, and possibly one which will add distinction to Christ Church.

Since writing the above, I have seen the report on the Canterbury Public Library, presented at the last annual meeting in July. From it I learn that the library was closed for stocktaking—a proceeding which has been long neglected—in May, and that the circulating branch was found contain 9.339 volumes, of which 3,856 were works of page 31 fiction, 1,083 of travel, and 243 of poetry and the drama. The reference branch contained 6,990 volumes. During the previous year 475 volumes had been added to the circulating, and 181 to the reference branch. An increase in the number of periodicals was approved of; reductions had been made in the amount of subscriptions in order to induce the taking of family tickets, and a system had been introduced of allowing visitors to Christ Church, on payment of two shillings, to enjoy the full privileges of the library for one month; and on the whole, the library seems to have taken a decided turn for the better.

* Supreme Court Library, Christ Church.

This is under the management of the Canterbury District Law Society, and is open daily from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. (except Sundays and Supreme Court holidays). All admitted legal practitioners, clerks of solicitors, pupils of barristers, and any other person, if properly recommended, and on payment of 21s. a month, are permitted to use the library. The library, which is strictly legal, contains about 3,000 volumes, and no books are permitted to go beyond the precincts of the court. A printed catalogue was issued in 1883, 8vo, pp. 94., which is very similar in arrangement and get-up to the catalogue of the Supreme Court Library, Wellington, already described.

Besides the Canterbury Public Library, and the Library of the Supreme Court, there are in Christ Church, libraries belonging to the Canterbury Museum, Canterbury College, and the Philosophical Institute of Canterbury. This last which is small, and almost entirely scientific, is stored in one of the rooms at the Canterbury Public Library.

That at Canterbury College, may be called a students' library, and is distributed throughout the various lecture rooms.

That at the Museum will eventually, no doubt, be of page 32 value, and more attention is being paid to it every year. It consists chiefly of scientific works, and of transactions of learned societies, and has received during the last few years many valuable donations from different parts of the world.