BOOK V. Chapter VII. Libraries of Germany, etc. Tubingen Uni perfectly for a door; when my Library attendants rushed into the room, each with an armful of books, which they placed on the ground as a sign of possession. Benches, chairs, and desks vanished in a moment, and... in a few days, all the books were arranged along the walls. The Doctors, who, soon after, entered the room by the usual door, were quite confounded. Not knowing what to say, they retired in silence; but they all harboured a secret grudge against me." They complained to the Grand Duke, who frankly told them that he found himself quite unable to cope with Goethe, and that it was the best plan to let him have his own way. In more recent years, the Castle or Granducal Libraries of Jena have all been incorporated with that of the University. Its latest accession of importance is the valuable Library of Dr. B. Schmid (the original cost of which is said to have exceeded 25,000 dollars), and by it the total number of volumes becomes upwards of 100,000. The Library is open to the Public on every day of the week except Sunday. 1 The present University Library of Tubingen was versity Library founded in 1562, in replacement of that older collection which had been destroyed by fire in 1534. In 1586 it was augmented by 2600 volumes bequeathed by the Syndicus L. von Grempp. In 1630 by the collection of Bocer; in 1797 by that of the Prince Bishop of Spires, P. C. von Limburg-Stirum; and in 1805, by that of G. D. Hoffmann. 1 Petzholdt, ut supra, 202, 203; Keysler, ut supra, iv, 324-327; Lewes, Life and Writings of Goethe, ii, 404-406. BOOK V. Chapter VII. Many other collections have been subsequently acquired, both by gift and by purchase; of which the most noticeable are the Hindustani works collected by Häberlin Germany, etc. at Calcutta, the Library-eminently rich in literary history-of J. D. Reuss, Chief Librarian at Göttingen; and the valuable Oriental and Theological books of Professor Steudel. Meanwhile, considerable accessions were also accruing from the duplicate books of the Stuttgart Library, and from the collections belonging to various secularised monasteries; so that, in the whole, the University Library has come to possess nearly 200,000 volumes; about 50,000 dissertations and other ephemeral pieces, and 2000 MSS. An enumeration of the separate works, in each of the Classes into which the collection is grouped, was made in 1851, and ran thus: The present average rate of yearly increase is stated to be about 2000 printed volumes. For the acquisition of which, and of MSS., a sum of 9000 florins is appropriated. 1 BOOK V. Chapter VII. The Library is publicly accessible; it lends out annually, on the average, about 20,000 volumes, chiefly, of course Germany, etc. to the Professors and Students of the University; and has, perhaps, about four hundred readers annually frequenting its Reading-room.1 University Library of Leipsic. The University Library of Leipsic is of monastic origin. When the Dominicans were expelled in 1543, they left behind some six hundred volumes which (by the care of Caspar Börner,) became the nucleus of the existing Library, now numbering more than 120,000 volumes, and, in other respects, an honour to the University; although but few years have passed since loud and frequent complaints were made of its insufficiency. To the Dominican books were soon added those of many other communities, "black, white and grey." Those of the Franciscans of Leipsic and Salza; those of the Cistercians of Altzelle and of Buch; those of the Benedictines of Chemnitz and of Pegau; and those of the Augustinian Canons of St. Thomas and of the Lauterberg, appear to have been especially noticeable. Collectively, they amounted to about 4000 volumes. Börner's own collection (added in 1547) was the first private one which the University Library acquired, but from that date, onwards, the list of private collections which it has successively absorbed (partly by gift and partly by purchase), rapidly becomes a long one. Professor J. G. Böhme's Library (1770) stands prominently out amongst the number for its special richness in the department of History; and that of another Leipsic 1 Petzholdt, ut supra, 348-353. BOOK V. Chapter VII. Professor, J. F. Gehler (bequeathed in 1813), for its respectable extent-24,000 volumes-as well as for its singular completeness in the department of Medicine Germany, etc. and the correlated sciences. In 1817, an important addition was made to the Philological section by the purchase of the Library of Professor G. H. Schäfer. The valuable collection of Dr. C. D. Beck, purchased in 1835, at a cost of 15,000 dollars, augmented several of the classes, and, more particularly, those of History, Theology and Classical Literature. Since 1840, the principal acquisitions have been a selection-extending to 2500 printed and 73 manuscript volumes-from the Library of Dr. E. F. K. Rosenmüller, and a most important series of MSS., chiefly Oriental, which Dr. C. Tischendorf had collected during his travels, and many of which have become widely known. by the descriptions he has given of them. Amongst them is the famous Codex Friderico-Augustanus of the fourth century ("a treasure of the first magnitude" as Dr. Petzholdt justly terms it,) and other Biblical MSS. of great value and rarity. Of the 120,000 volumes which are stated to be now in the University Library, about 2000 rank amongst the Incunabula of printing, and about 2500 are MSS. A sum of nearly 5000 dollars, on the average, is available for the increase of the Library, and is expended under the direction of a special Committee appointed for the purpose. From the Pauline building (Paulinum—in old books the usual designation of the Library is Bi 1 E. G. Noehden, Account of the Libraries at Leipsic, in the Classical Journal, xxii, 438-442. Extent and character of the University Library of Leipsic. BOOK V. Chapter VII. bliotheca Paulina-)the Library was in 1835 removed University to the Augustan (Augusteum), but eleven years afterGermany, etc. wards it returned to its former locality, which was Libraries of Rostock University Library. enlarged for its accommodation. The Reading Room is freely and daily accessible to the educated Public (steht jedem Gebildeten frei, is the expression used in its Regulations, as in those of most of the Libraries of German Universities); and books are lent out to the Professors and Tutors of the University; to Students, properly recommended by a Professor; to the Clergy and civil functionaries of the town; and to persons of known literary pursuits resident in Leipsic, at the discretion of the Principal Librarian.' Of the origin of the Library of the University of Rostock there are two different accounts. The one traces it to the purchase, by Duke John Albert of Mecklenburgh, of a collection of books at Frankfort, in 1552. The other dates its foundation, 1569, on the authority of an entry in the Liber Facultatis Philosophica in Academia Rostochiensi, which reads: "Anno 1569, semestri æstivo inchoata est collectio Bibliotheca", &c. Whichever be the true account, it does not appear that the collection attained much importance until towards the end of the eighteenth century, when it was incorporated with the collection, some 10,000 volumes in extent, which the Mecklenburgh Princes had bestowed on the short-lived University of Bützow. In 1817, Professor O. G. Tychsen bequeathed his Library, which for 1 Petzholdt, Handbuch, ut supra. |