=Free Libraries.=--In order of time reference should be made to the fund of nearly £15,000 raised in 1879 to refurnish the Reference Library after the fire, and to the valuable gifts of books detailed at p. 72 _et seq._ =The Art Gallery Purchase Fund= originated in an offer of Messrs. Tangye, on 3rd July, 1880, to contribute £5,000 to a fund for the purchase of examples of art for the New Art Gallery, since built by the Gas Committee as previously stated (p. xiii.), and a further £5,000 on condition that an equal sum was raised by public subscription. The sum of £7,000 additional was raised and placed at the disposal of a Special Committee of the Town Council, called the “Art Gallery Purchase Committee.” =The Mason Science College.=--For a full account of which (see p. 45), was opened 1st October, 1880. Its cost was £60,000, and it is endowed with landed property producing £3,600 per annum. Of the eleven Trustees, five are appointed by the Town Council. =The Wilkes Bequest.=--Mr. Alfred Salt Wilkes, a Manufacturer in Birmingham, who died on the 29th July, 1881, left a sum of money expected to realise £98,000 for division, after two life interests, between the Birmingham and Midland Institute and the General Hospital. =Municipal School of Art.=--On the 9th of November, 1881, the retiring Mayor, Mr. Richard Chamberlain, announced to the Council that Miss Ryland had offered £10,000, Messrs. Richard and George Tangye, another £10,000 (afterwards increased to £10,937), and Mr. Cregoe Colmore a piece of land worth £14,000 for the building of the present School of Art. The foundation stone was laid 31st March, 1884, by Mr. Richard Tangye, and the building (see p. 125) finished and opened on 14th September, 1885. The former School of Art, a voluntary association supported by public subscription (and to which Miss Ryland had been a generous donor) being transferred to the Corporation. =The Princess Alice Orphanage=, at Chester Road, was established, 1882, partly by a donation of £10,000 by Mr. Solomon Jevons, of Birmingham. =The Lloyds’ Almshouses=, in Belgrave Road, were founded by the widow of Mr. James Lloyd, a banker, of Birmingham. =The Jaffray Suburban Hospital=, at Erdington, for the treatment of chronic and non-contagious cases in connection with the Birmingham General Hospital, is the latest, but not the least of the gifts to the town. It was built and furnished at the sole cost of Mr. John Jaffray, and opened on the 27th November, 1885. An enumeration of these gifts would not be complete without reference to the five gifts of public parks particularised in the list at page xii.