THE BODLEIAN LIBRARY

Otago Daily Times, Issue 18513, 25 March 1922, Page 7

THE BODLEIAN LIBRARY

NEW ZEALANDER’S GIFT OF £SOOO. (From Ogb Own Correspondent.! LONDON, February 1. A gift of £SOOO from Mr George BodIcy, of Hamilton, to_ the. Bodleian Library, Oxford, not only gains fitting acknowledgment in the pages of the Bodleian Quarterly Record, but the benefaction ia noted in most of the London daily papers. “The Library,” says the Record, “has just received a very interesting as well aa a very welcome gift of £SOOO from Mr George Bodley, of Hamilton, New Zealand. “That our latest benefactor bears the name of our founder is not a mere coincidence Mr George Bodley does not claim kinship with Sir Thomas, but there is a tradition in bis family that such a connection exists. He has always had a great respect f6r his illustrious namesake, and after reading accounts of the library decided that ho would like to help in carrying out the intentions of the founder. We should like to claim Mr George Bodley as one of the family, but, however that may be, in generosity and public spirit he certainly belongs to it. We hope that he may find time to visit Oxford before long, so that we may show him something of the institution which he has so graciously helped.’’ “Mr Bodliy;, a citizen of New Zealand,” says the Daily Mail, “has shown the. magio which a famous name exerts on its possessors by his generous gift of £SOOO to the famous library at Oxford that was endowed by Sir Thomas Bodley’s munificence in Elizabethan days. He claims no direct relationship with Sir Thomas Bodley, though there is in his family a tradition of connection with him which this donation may help to establish. For it shows something of Sir Thomas’s love of learning, his desire to benefit his race, and his affection for a great centre of culture. Nowhere will such a benefaction bo more precious or more valued, as it is the bitter truth that, owing to the poverty of the university, the Bodleian is at present stinted of funds, and has experienced difficulty in- the proper cataloguing of its vast wealth of manuscripts and books.” The librarian to-day informs me that tht money will be regarded as capital and has already been invested. The interest will be used for current expenses. This is the wisest policy, he says, and is in accordance with the wishes of the donor.