BOOK III. Chapter XX. Town Libraries of Scotland. force: (1.) "No student shall have more than three voUniversity and lumes out of the Library at one and the same time, nor shall any Member of Senate, nor any Lecturer, nor Minister, have above twenty volumes at one and the same time." (2.) "No Member of Faculty, Lecturer, or Minister of Glasgow, or any other person, shall keep a Library book above six months; nor longer than three months, if a demand be made by another person, and notified to him, under the penalty of five shillings sterling." The Commissioners add: "From parts of the evidence it appears that there have been times, when students were in a great measure, if not altogether, precluded from the use of the Library, at least as a matter of right. If there were no other reason for pronouncing this to have been an unwarrantable exercise of power, it is enough to say, that the declared purpose for which voluntary contributions were obtained for building a Common Library, and furnishing it with books, as well as otherwise enlarging the fabric of the College, was for the public and private use of the Students." But, of course, they by no means regard this as involving an indiscriminate or unlimited access. On the points of discussion which arose out of the Copyright privilege, the Scottish Commissioners exOpinions of the pressed views very different from those, previously quoted in this book, of the Commissioners on CamCopyright-Tax. bridge University. They highly appreciate the import University Com mission on the ance of preserving "even the fugitive treatises which relate to subjects so familiar as to be thought unworthy 1 Leges Bibliotheca Academia Glasguensis, in Munimenta, ut supra, iii, 455, seqq. OPINIONS ON THE COPYRIGHT - TAX. 25 BOOK III. Chapter XX. Town Libraries of Scotland. the notice of contemporaries, but which might often furnish information .... not to be found in graver vo- University and lumes;" but appear to assume that there is no way of securing this advantage save by a tax. They then proceed to argue that "in many other points of view it may be of great importance both to the acquirements and principles of the young, that the places of public education should be regularly supplied with all the productions of our native literature. In the most secluded corners of the island, new publications may be circulated, so as often, in the most alluring form to give currency to errors which the instructors of youth would anxiously and promptly counteract, if they fell sooner under their notice. No part of education can be more valuable than that which guides the unexperienced to the proper selection of books, and which guards them against the mischievous influence of sophistry. But these ends may probably be less extensively gained, if public teachers do not possess opportunities of examining every work which is successively published." It is amusing to contrast this deliberate opinion with that which the author of the Bibliographical Decameron has recorded (in truly Dibdinian English): "The commutation of this Act . . . . must be a very comfort to Curators. They may now blow off the froth and filth, and select the absolutely integral value of the productions of the press." In Glasgow the working of this enactment had been more carefully attended to than in any other of the Scottish Universities. Thus it is that, whilst Aberdeen has but £320 a-year from the Consolidated Fund, BOOK III. Chapter XX. Glasgow has £707. Its number of volumes which in University and 1830 was but about 30,000, had increased in 1849 to 58,096; and probably at present (1858) exceeds 66,000. The number of Manuscripts is 242.1 Town Libraries of Scotland. The Hunterian Glasgow. Besides the Library which is strictly its own, the University of Glasgow is Trustee, for the Public, of the fine Library and Museum formed by the eminent anatomist Dr. William Hunter (1718-1783). A man of a noble spirit, he derived gratification, whilst yet in all the ardour of the youthful collector, from the thought that his treasures would be of public utility. He lavished in their pursuit all that a benevolent heart left at his disposal out of the large gains of his professional career. His first idea seems to have been that he would found a Museum in London, with an endowment for lectureships, but eventually he selected the metropolis of his native county for its site, and the Senate of the University, where he had been educated for its trusteeship. His Library is especially rich in Greek and Latin classics. The early printers of Venice and Florence are represented by many books on vellum of rare beauty. Many of the choicest specimens of the Askew and other rare editions in famous collections had passed into Dr. Hunter's possession under the auction hammer,-including the Aldine Plato; the Mentz Cicero; the Azzoguidi Ovid; the Florence Homer; the Catullus, the Nepos, the Livy, the Pliny, the Sallust and the Dante of Venice. Choice first and Hunter's 1 Munimenta Universitatis Glasguensis, iii, 403-480; General Report of Commissioners on the Universities and Colleges of Scotland, Appendix, 278281; Dibdin, Northern Tour, ii, 717. THE HUNTERIAN LIBRARY AT GLASGOW. 27 BOOK III. Chapter XX. Town Libraries of Scotland. Amongst the antiquities of English printing there are at least nine productions of Caxton (Caton, Chaucer, University and Cronicles, Godefroy, Golden Legende, Myrrour of the World, Lyf of Christe, Polycronicon, and Eneydos), and four of Wynkyn de Worde. The MSS. include a splendid French translation with miniatures of the Vita Christi of Ludolph the Carthusian, from the Gaignat collection; a curious series of original Elizabethan proclamations, with the Queen's autograph signatures, and with those of her great officers of State; many superb Missals; and curious pieces of English and Scottish poetry. These MSS. amount to 600 volumes; the printed books to about 13,000 volumes. The whole of the collections bequeathed by Hunter to the University are said, by Dr. Dibdin (I know not on what authority), to have been valued at £130,000. In addition to which the sum of £8000 was bequeathed as an augmentation fund. To its uniting the characters of a University town, and of a great mart of commerce, Glasgow is doubtless indebted for the number and diversity of its public benefactions. The men of letters, indeed, here as elsewhere, far transcend the men of trade, in their care for them "who are to come after," small as have usually been their comparative means. But the example has proved a spur to honourable rivalry. After the Boyds and the Hunters come the Stirlings and the M'Lellans. in Glasgow, in 1735. It is yet but a hundred and twenty years, since Glas- The book-trade gow, notwithstanding its University, was declared to be "too narrow for two booksellers at a time." Forty years afterwards, an adventurous tradesman set up the BOOK 111. Chapter XX. Town Libraries of Scotland. calling of a "Book-auctioneer." At this time the town University and possessed a population of 34,000 persons, of whom sixteen were engaged in the sale either of books or of stationary of one kind or other. These sixteen dealers joined in a petition against the perilous novelty of bookauctions. But soon afterwards one or two Circulating Libraries were established. For a Public Town Library Glasgow had to wait until 1791. Glasgow Town Library, founded by Walter Stirling. Walter Stirling was a native of Glasgow, and became a member of the "Merchants' House," in 1768, under the designation of a "Home-Trader." According to the author of that amusing picture of a Scottish city in the last century, Glasgow and its Clubs, "his own Library abounded in choice specimens of bibliographic lore." His Trustees say merely that the number of his books was "760 volumes, and their value, estimated by an appraiser, was £160." However this may be, he gave by his last Will, "To and in favour of the Lord Provost of the City of Glasgow and his successors, the sum of One thousand pounds, and my tenement lying on the east-side of Miller street in the said City, and my share in the Tontine Society, for the sole and only purpose of purchasing a Library, and for appointing a Librarian for the taking charge of the books that may belong to me at my death, as well as those which may be purchased in future from the fund above-mentioned." By other provisions of the Will, the Lord Provost is always to be a Director of the Library so to be formed, ex officio, and there are to be twelve other Directors, chosen in equal proportions, by the Town Council, the Presbytery, the Merchants' House, and the Faculty of |