In the "American Almanac" for 1837 was published the earliest statistical account of American libraries which I have found. It is confined to a statement of the numerical contents of twenty public and university libraries, being all the American libraries which then (sixty years since) contained over 10,000 volumes each. The largest library in the United States at that date was that of the Philadelphia Library Company, which embraced 44,000 volumes. The first organized effort to collect the full statistics of libraries in the United States was made in 1849, by Professor C. C. Jewett, then librarian of the Smithsonian Institution, and the results were published in 1851, under the auspices of that institution, in a volume of 207 pages. It contains interesting notices of numerous libraries, only forty of which, however, contained as many as 10,000 volumes each. In 1859, Mr. W. J. Rhees, of the Smithsonian Institution, published "A Manual of Public Libraries, Institutions, and Societies in the United States," a large volume of 687 pages, filled with statistical information in great detail, and recording the number of volumes in 1338 libraries. This work was an expansion of that of Professor Jewett. The next publication of the statistics of American Libraries, of an official character, was published in "The National Almanac," Philadelphia, for the year 1864, pp. 58-62, and was prepared by the present writer. It gave the statistics of 104 libraries, each numbering 10,000 volumes or upwards, exhibiting a gratifying progress in all the larger collections, and commemorating the more advanced and vigorous of the new libraries which had sprung into life. The work of collecting and publishing the statistics of American Libraries has for years past been admirably performed by the United States Bureau of Education. Begun in 1875, that institution has issued four tabular statements of all libraries responding to its circulars of inquiry, and having (as last reported in 1897) one thousand volumes or upwards. Besides these invaluable reports, costing much careful labor and great expense, the Bureau of Education published, in 1876, an extensive work wholly devoted to the subject of libraries, bearing the title "Special Report on Public Libraries in the United States." This publication (now wholly out of print) consisted of 1222 pages, replete with information upon the history, management, and condition of American Libraries, under the editorship of S. R. Warren and S. N. Clark, of the Bureau of Education. It embraced many original contributions upon topics connected with library science, by experienced librarians, _viz._: Messrs. W. F. Poole, Justin Winsor, C. A. Cutter, J. S. Billings, Theo. Gill, Melvil Dewey, O. H. Robinson, W. I. Fletcher, F. B. Perkins, H. A. Homes, A. R. Spofford, and others.