"The work with the children, which showed such a remarkable increase last year, has shown even greater results, and we see new possibilities for the coming year. This department is decidedly aggressive in its methods, and no phase of public social service in this city has awakened such wide interest. The Story Hour, already popular, was given a decided help onwards by the series of lectures {92} which the Children's Librarians arranged for during October and November, when Miss Marie Shedlock, of London, England, spoke to five delighted audiences on 'Story Telling.' That part of the Story Hour which is devoted to Canadian historical characters is really a National Movement, for it supplies to the children, many of whom are of foreign parentage, a Canadian historical background, something much needed in a new country with its great problems to be solved by those who now are but children. This year there were 12,671 children in the Story Hours and 249,260 books were circulated among boys and girls." The "Story Hour" is a semi-weekly feature of the library work, and one which has developed unmeasured ardour on the part of the youthful auditors. Another signally refining and helpful influence is that of the culture of flowers; a garden plot, or beds of flowers, being a feature of the grounds surrounding each of the fourteen libraries. The children are encouraged to aid in this care of flowers, and seats placed in the gardens enable summer readers to pursue their work amid this beauty, and in the invigorating air. The "J. Ross Robertson Historical Collection," housed in the Reference Library, is as a gallery of Canadiana of the utmost value to the student of the history of the Dominion. The collection numbers already three thousand two hundred and twenty-nine pictures, and in the year of 1915 alone, it was visited by more than twelve thousand people. These pictures tell the story of the development of Canada from the forest, lake, and prairie, with {93} tribes of wandering Red Men, into the land of fruit, grain, and manufactures. Mr. Robertson has proved a real benefactor to the entire province as well as the Dominion, for students come from all parts of the country to study this collection.