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THE RATIOIVALE OF FREE PULFLZC UBRARIES. 49
public by individuals or societies. It is to be hoped that tho
list of benefactions will be largely increased in future years.
The emnomica1 working of Free Libraries has been much
advanced by the invention of Indicators, which, like fingerposts
at cross-roads, afford a great deal of information at tho
least possible cost. The one now most ip use waa invented
by Mr. John Elliot, librarian to the Wolverhampton Public
Library. It was preceded, indeed, by a rude kind of indicatorboard
with the numbers of the books painted upon it, and pegs
which could be stuck into holes so as to show to the library
attendants whet.her the book so numbered was in or out.
Mr. Diall, of Liverpool, improved upon this board by using
numbered blocks, EO moving upon s slide that they would
exhibit to the public the numbers of all books available for
borrowing.
Mr. Elliot’s indicator is a much more valuable instrument, for
it not only shows at a glance whether suy book is in or out, but
it also affords a means of recording mechanically the names of
borrowers, so as almost entirely to replace tho of use book-ledgers
or other written records. It is well described by Mr. W. J.
Haggerston, of the South Shields Library, at a conference of
the Northern Union of Mechanics’ Institutions. Some account
of it will also be found in the “Transactions” of the First Meeting
of the Library Association, in the paper of Mr. James Yates
(pp. 76-78)already referred to. The Indicator consists of upright
square frames, each containing a thousand small shelves, in ten
vertical divisions of one hundred shelves each. The two faces
of the frame are identical, with the exception that the one
exposed towards the public is covered with plate-glass so as to
prevent meddling, while tho librarians have access to the inner
face. Each shelf is numbered on both faces with the number
of the one book which it represents. When a borrower takes
a book out he hands his library ticket to the librarian, who
writes upon it the number of the book taken and the date of
borrowing, and then places it on the shelf corresponding to the
book, where it remains until the book is returned. If any other
peraon comes intending to borrow the =me book, he looks at
the Indicator, and seeing the ticket of the borrower lying on
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