LIBRARY GRANTS.

Wanganui Herald, Volume XLIX, Issue 14234, 6 March 1914, Page 4

LIBRARY GRANTS.

Libraries throughout the Dominion will share this week in the distribution of a grant of .£4OOO voted by Parliament for their encouragement, and distributed by the Education Department upon a .basis which secures for the smaller institutions special consideration. Those having largo incomes, such as the city libraries, are subsidised on ,£IOO of their receipts, which this year moans a grant of <£23 11s 3d from the exchequer, out small libraries have a sum added to their income to make up the nominal amount on which the payment is distributed. The returns show that even in remote districts some kind of reading institution exists. No fewer than 401 libraries having applied for the subsidy. Their actual aggregate income last year amounted to £15,760. This sum includes the receipts of the city libraries. The Education Department is concerning- itself about ths dais of book ppijchased 'with "the subsidy. It particularly enjoins upon the library authorities that a due proportion of the

books pure based shall be those which have a permanent value, that is, to use the, department’s own phrase, “books of more than merely passing interest,” In makmg application for the subsidy library authorities have to describe the class of books bought during the previous year, and it has been found that over 90 per cent, consists of fiction, and fiction of a very ephemeral description at that. Possibly we may in the near future see an interesting attempt to ensure that lihraies benefiting from the subsidy can show a fair range of works dealing with history, biography, travel, science, and the line arts, literature, and reference.