Mr. Winchester, of the Russell Free Library, Middletown, Conn., said in his report, last January: "A departure from the ordinary rules governing the use of the library has been made in favor of the teachers in the city schools, allowing a teacher to take to the school, a number of books upon any topic which may be the subject of study for the class for the time, and to retain them beyond the time regularly allowed." In a letter three months later he writes, "I cannot trace directly to this arrangement any change in the reading of young folks. We have taken a good deal of pains to get good books for the younger readers, and I make it a point to assist them whenever I can. I feel quite sure that, if trash is shut out of the library and withheld from young readers, and, if good and interesting books are offered to them, they will soon learn not to care for the trash." Mr. Bassett, of the Bronson Library, Waterbury, Conn., says in his printed report: "The librarian can do a little towards leading young book-borrowers towards the selection of proper books, but it does not amount to much unless his efforts are seconded by parents and teachers. It is of little use, I fear, to appeal to parents to look after their children's reading. It is possible that they do not know that, in not a few cases, boys and girls from eight to sixteen years of age, even while attending school, draw from three to six volumes a week to read, and often come for two volumes a day. That they fail to realize the effects of so much reading on their children's minds is evident when we hear them say, and with no little pride, too, 'Our children are great readers; they read all the time.' Such parents ought to know that instead of turning out to be prodigies of learning, these library gluttons are far more likely to become prodigious idiots, and that teachers find them, as a rule, the poorest scholars and the worst thinkers." He adds an appeal to teachers: "Give out questions that demand research, and send out pupils to the library for information if necessary, and be assured that a true librarian enjoys nothing so much as a search, with an earnest seeker, after truths that are hidden away in his books. Do not hesitate even to ask questions that you cannot answer, and rely upon your pupils to answer them, and to give authorities, and do not be ashamed to learn of your pupils. Work with them as well as for them. But, whatever else you do, do not waste your time in urging your pupils to stop story-reading and to devote their time to good books. A parent can command this, you cannot; but you can make the use of good books, and the acquisition of knowledge not found in books, attractive and even necessary, and your ability to do this determines your real value as a teacher. Your work is to change your earth-loving moles into eagle-eyed and intelligent observers of all that is on, in, above, and under the earth." Mr. Bassett writes that as a result of this appeal