NEW ENCYCLOPAEDIA BRITANNICA

Press, Volume LXVIII, Issue 14306, 18 March 1912, Page 5

NEW ENCYCLOPAEDIA BRITANNICA

The Anibersitp of CAmbridge

What is tlic fundamental condition of success in modern life ? You will answer, Knowieage— accurate, up-to-aaic, comprehensive knowledge. You have an opportunity today of obtaining on favourable terms the most accurate, most up-to-date, most comprehensive library.of universal knowledge in the English language. The University of Cambridge (England) has just published the new (11th) edition of the famous Encyclopaedia Britannica. For the initial sale in Great Britain the absolutely minimum price at which the work could be sold was fixed, and the response was so rapid that over a million volumes were sold before the price was increased. It was felt that the Over-sea Dominions should in fairness be given an opportunity of buying this indispensable work at the same rock-bottom price. The Cambridge University Press has therefore shipped a limited number of sets for sale in New Zealand at the minimum price. To judge from the avidity with which the New Zealand public has always seized the chance of acquiring authoritative \v6rks of reference, it will only be a brief time before these sets are sold, and the price increased. It is therefore imperative that you should send your order AT once if-yqu wish to be included in the list of purchasers at the temporary minimum price. ■ You are not asked to pay cash in full with your order.. A single . guinea will secure you immediate possession of the complete work in 29 volumes. Payments may be completed by monthly instalments on a scale so low as to be easily within the compass of the most moderate income. It is impossible here to give any adequate notion of such a magnificent work as the new Encyclopaedia Britannica, which offers trustworthy and up-to-date guidance on every subject—theoretical ■ or practical—of interest to-day to every class of readers; which is in itself a complete library of reference, an all-embracing yet easily accessible survey of the world's knowledge in the 20th century; and which, while of the highest educational value, may yet be picked up —in its new India paper format —and read, volume by volume, with far greater pleasure than the average novel produces. This announcement is rather a formal intimation of the Minimum Price Offer now made to New Zealanders. It is an urgent notice to you to make without delay the fullest inquiry about the new Encyclopaedia Britannica, and to ; satisfy 3'ourself that it is all which is claimed for it. An illustrated prospectus, with 56 specimen pages on the thin India paper, will be sent post free on receipt of the coupon at the foot ,-l this oa^rc

ft Is New. The llth edition of the Encyclopaedia Britaunica is in no sense of the word a mere reprint or revision of previous editions. It is the fruit of a wholly new survey of knowledge in the first decade of the 20th century, which was undertaken by a large editorial staff with the active co-operation of the most distinguished scholars and highest practical experts in many countries. As the result of this survey—which covered the whole ground of human activity in every field of research—more than 80 per cent, of the work has been freshly written for the llth edition. The remainder, amounting to about 17 per cent., represent , ; such portions of the previous editions—especially the 9th—as proved. on careful investigation, to be worth revising and reprinting as representing a more learned or more lucid view of a subject than *ny new writer was likely to achieve. Thus such literary gems: •s Macaulay's biographies of Goldsmith and Dr. Johnson, or R. L. Stevenson's critical essay on Beranger,. or A. C. Swinburne's studies of the Elizabethan dramatists, have been retained because no living writer could have done them again so brilliantly. Purchasers of the new work may rest assured that they possess all that was of permanent value in earlier editions, «s well as more than 20,000 pages of entirely fresh material. It Is Up-to-Date. The llth edition of the Encyclopaedia Britannica is the most uniformly up-to-date encyclopaedia ever published. As a rule great works of reference are issued during a series of years, so that the first volume is getting antiquated before the last appears. But the new Encyclopaedia Britannica was written and published as a complete work, so that no important piece of knowledge available in 1910 has been omitted. To take examples from the field of national history alone, the account of English political events is brought down to the elections of December, 1910; the Portuguese Revolution, which only broke out in October of that year, is adequately described ; and the causes which have led up to the recent changes in the constitution of China are traced as far as the meeting of the first Chinese national assembly in October, 1910. What is more important is that the standpoint throughout is that of 1910; such important matters as aviation, radio-activity, Mendelism, industrial legislation, liquor laws, world-politics, military science, medicine, and so forth, have been handled by competent authorities in the light of their latest developments. The knowledge of the past, in fact, has been set forth in the light of the 20th century throughout; and in many cases the high authorities who write the articles, being themselves in the forefront of research, have included facts and theories which are not yet matters of common knowledge. The new Encyclopaedia Britannica is the ideal library of the rising generation.

It Is Trustworthy. The new Encyclopaedia Britannica is published by tbe English University of Cambridge, the foremost school of science in the world, which is responsible for its general scholarship and accurate learning. The 1,50 a contributors who have written the 40,000 articles-stand in need of no guarantee, for in all cases they were selected as the highest authorities available on their special subjects. For the last century the Encyclopaedia Britannica has held a unique position among works of reference, because of its principle of going for articles to the men and women who are themselves the leading authorities: in the 11th edition this principle has been more thoroughly carried out than ever before. The teaching staff of 150 universities and colleges all over the world has given 750 of its best men to the work, while the other half of the contributors are practical experts in politics, art, industry, commerce, etc., of high standing. It is impossible to insist too strongly on the advantages derived by the purchaser from the fact that he can thus consult a first-hand authority on every subject. The new Encyclopaedia Britannica is not a mere compilation, but is itself a work of consummate authority in all departments of knowledge, which gives tbe reader safe guidance in opinion and practice. Alike on its practical and theoretical side, the work is therefore the most useful and trustworthy encyclopaedia ever published. It is impossible to over-estimate . the value, alike to the purchaser and his family, of having such a library of universal knowledge in the home. It Iβ Comprehensive. The new Encyclopaedia Britannica covers all departments of human knowledge and activity, from theology and science to industry and sport. It consists of 40,000 articles, arranged in alphabetical order, and dealing with persons of every nationality and all periods (including persons still living), places, histories (whether of countries or of institutions), languages, literatures, arts, sciences, religions, philosophies, law and economics, industries and manufactures, commerce and finance, social and domestic questions, sports and games—together with all the instruments or ideas connected with them. In fact, whatever word may reasonably prompt a question as to the person, place, object, action or thought for which it stands, forms the title of an article (varying, according to the demands of the subject, from a few lines to a long treatise) in which the desired information is conveyed in an authoritative manner by a renowned specialist. The work, in short, is a universal question-answerer, which will throw light on every matter that occurs in your daily work, your recreation, your reading of books and newspapers, or your conversation. The index, of 500,000 references, enables you at once to find the smallest detail on which you desire information.

It Is Easy To Handle. Among the important novelties which characterise the new Encyclopaedia Britannica, a high place must be given to a revolutionary improvement in its manufacture, which has made it as easy to handle as an ordinary novel. In its special impression on India paper—a very thin but opaque paper which has hitherto been used chiefly for printing expensive Bibles—the volumes are reduced to one third of the weight and thickness of the impression on ordinary book paper. Instead of the heavy and cumbrous volumes associated with the Enc3 r clopaedia Britamiica in the past, the new edition is now to be bought in slender volumes which can be read with ease in an armchair. The binding is so devised that a volume can be folded back, cover to cover, without injury, and held in one hand as comfortably as a magazine. The illustration on this page shows the India paper volumes in use, and will convey a better idea of their convenience than any words can give. Out of the first 35,000 purchasers about 90 per cent. —practically all the private buyers—selected this style. It costs only a trifle more than the impression on ordinary paper,' and no one who has once used it will be content with the usual cumbrous style of reference book in future. Further, the ease with which these light and slender volumes may be handled will encourage the purchaser—and his family—to take them up for recreative reading, and so to associate at first hand with the leading minds of the 20th century. It Is Easy To Consult. Whilst the India paper format of the new Encyclopaedia Britannica makes its volumes easy to read, the carefully considered arrangement of the contents makes them easy to consult. Whatever question arises in the reader's mind can be answered by their help with the minimum waste of time. The plan of this 11th edition has been enlarged to include a far greater number of short articles than were previously to be found in the work ; the last complete edition had only 16,000 headings, as against 40,000 in the present edition. These short articles chiefly deal with questions of detail, previously merged and hidden from the hasty enquirer in the discussion of a main subject to which they were treated as incidentals. Thus the agricultural reader will find separate articles on such subjects as irrigation, drainage, manures, threshing or ploughing; liquor laws, labour legislation, strikes, are treated under these headings and not in a long article on economics. Where a question is too minute to be answered in a separate article, the admirable index of 500,000 references comes into play. Thus the Encyclopaedia Britannica, long acknowledged to be the most comprehensive and trustworthy of encyclopaedias, has now also been made the easiest for prompt reference— the ideal work for the inquirer in a hurry.

; ' Before buying an Encyclopaedia you naturally ask : "Is it (!) new, (2) up-to-date, (3V trustworthy, (4) compreherrive, (5) easy to use, (6) easy to buy?" A brief answer to these questions in the case of the Encyclopaedia Britannica is given below. Fuller details will be found in the prospectus, sent posl free on application to the Cambridge University Press, 2 Harris Street, Wellington (P.O. Bfex 142).

The University of Cambridge (England) nolds the copyright of the Encyclopaedia Britannica, and the entirely new (11th) edition is now issued from the Cambridge University Fresi. There are 28 volumes of text and an index volume. The llth edition is not a reprint, but an entirely new work, based throughout upon a fresh survey of the whole field of human knowledge, and the information is brought up to the autumn of 1910. No further edition will be published before 1925 at soonest, so that the present {! Hh) edition will remain the standard work of reference for :.'. isast 14 years. Each volume of text averages £.10 pages. The whole work contains over 40 million words. There are 40,000 separate articles, 7,000 illustrations in the text, 450 full-page plates (many coloured), and 417 maps. The whole work was made at one time, nothing being printed until the text was practically finished. This ensured proper editorial supervision of the work as a whole, and allows the earlier articles to be as up-to-date as the later ones. As a result, the whole 28 volumes of text have been issued together as a complete work of even date throughout. There were more than 1,500 contributors to the new (11th) edition, including 599 members of the teaching staff of 81 Universities, 168 Fellows of the Royal Society, and 47 officials of the British Museum. The editorial staff numbered 64. . The special impression on thin India paper (strongly recommended) occupies only 30 inches of shelf room, and weighs about 84 pounds. The impression on ordinary book paper occupies 7 feet of shelf room and weighs about 240 pounds. The cost of the work, before a single volume was printed, amounted to £230,000. The complete work will be delivered immediately on payment of a single guinea, and the balance may be paid by instalments spread over 4, 8, or 12 months, or by monthly instalments of one guinea, so as to suit the convenience of every purchaser. But only a limited number of sets are available at the present minimum price, which will be increased as soon as the stock is exhausted, or even sooner, at the discretion of the publisher*. Immediate armlication is therefore inrmerative.

It Is Easy To Buy. The present enterprise of the Cambridge University Press makes the new Encyclopaedia Britannica one of the easiest books to buy in New Zealand. As a rule,- the book-buyer in the Dominion pays more than the London price for new English books—quite reasonably, in view of the cost of obtaining them from London. But the new Encyclopaedia Britannica is tempos arily offered at a price considerably lower than that now charged in London. The work was originally offered to English subscribers in advance of publication at the minimum subscription price which could, possibly be asked for such a work. The price has now been advanced in England, but a limited number of seta have been shipped to this Dominion for sale at the minimum subscription price. Those who apply at once, can secure the complete work (now ready for delivery) on terms identical with.those offered in Great Britain to the earliest subscribers before publication. . Comparing the price of; the ordinary impression in cloth with that of the average 6/- book, yon will find that the Encyclopaedia Britannica gives 15 times as much for less than 3 times the price. The purchaser of the Encyclopaedia gets 8,000 words for a penny, as against less than 2,000 words for a penny in the case of other new books. As to the relative value of matter thus sold there can be no comparison. Further, the price of the new Encyclopaedia Britannica—which, though relatively so low, amounts for 29 volumes to more than everybody can conveniently pay cash down—may be divided into 4, 8 or 12 monthly instalments, or may be paid at the rate of one guinea per month, on theplan originally introduced by '.'The Times" with so much popular approval. In this way the world's foremost library of reference may be secured by anyone for a single guinea, followed by a temporary outlay of only £\ Is. per month. Thus payment may be completed at leisure, oa terms within the reach of every income, whilst the possession of the new Encyclopaedia Britannica will make itself gratefully felt every day, alike for education and pleasurable reading.