20-24 septembrie 2009 - Biblioteca Metropolitana Bucuresti

132 Liana Păuncontrolled by the lending fees or the provisions concerning the situations inwhich the books were stained, deteriorated or lost. The library functionedon the basis of subscriptions with a validity of at least one month (twoflorins and 30 creitzars – small silver coin, the hundredth part of a florin),3 months (seven florins and 3 – creitzars), six months (twelve florins and 30creitzars) or one year (twenty-five florins), to which a five florin guaranteewas added up to the expiry of the subscription. The owner of the libraryreserved the right to increase this fee, in special cases. The payment wasalways in advance and by means of these subscriptions readers could borrowa volume every day. Those who wanted to borrow more than one volumeper day paid the subscription twice or thrice depending on the number ofbooks. Upon application, the subscribers received a catalogue of the booksavailable in the library and a subscription booklet with several headingswhere the name and address of the borrower were written, the amount of thesubscription and the validity period. Each time the identification number ofthe borrowed book was recorded; a ledger having the same headings as inthe subscription booklet was kept by the owner of the library and the returnas well as the borrowing of the books was recorded in the two ledgers. Thesubscription booklet had to be produced upon return of a book in order toinscribe it in the ledger. The subscriber could not borrow a book withoutreturning the preceding one.The regulation offered lending opportunities to the readers located inthe villages according to a mail subscription which was more expensive.Those interested could borrow at the most five books and severalsubscription types were made available: for one year 40 florins, sixmonths – 20 florins, three months – 10 florins and one month – 4 florins,to which a 5 florin guarantee per borrowed volume was added. There alsowas a warning in case the readers wanted to renounce the subscription,regardless of its duration; they would not get their money back.The transportation costs were in charge of the subscribers who were alsomade responsible for any deterioration of the books during the transport.In order to provide the flow of the books, mainly those of special interest,the regulation stipulated that a book had to be returned in three weeks atmost, even if the library had several copies of that particular book in orderto positively answer to other subscribers’ requests. The regulation wasvery drastic with regard to the condition of the books upon return: thosedeteriorated or dirty were not accepted anymore and had to be replacedwith new ones, bought at the price in the book shop, whereas the loss ordamage of one volume of a work imposed the purchase of all volumesand not only that damaged or lost. The readers were advised to borrow