=18. Endowments.=--Little need be said about the foundation of public libraries by endowment or bequest. The wills of Stephen Mitchell and George Baillie, of Glasgow, are models of what a liberal bequest should be, both as regards the amounts bequeathed and the conditions laid down for the formation of the library itself. The practical condition attached to all the gifts made by Mr Andrew Carnegie and Mr J. Passmore Edwards for public library purposes should be adopted by every benefactor who proposes to found a library. This is the very sensible one that, if the gift of money is accepted by the community, the local authority must adopt the Public Libraries Acts, in order to maintain the library in a state of efficiency for all time. The only alteration suggested in the form of future bequests is that, when money is offered to a small town on the condition that it adopts the Libraries Acts, the whole of the gift should not necessarily take the form of a building fund. Small towns usually have very inadequate incomes from the library rate, and for this reason it might be wise if a fair proportion of the gift were directed to be invested as a book fund. A large library building without books is by no means as useful to the people as a much less ambitious building provided with a fund which permits of the annual purchase of £50 to £100 worth of books, independently of the library rate. At the same time, the endowment of libraries in the manner suggested would not always act as an encouragement to town councils to provide proper funds for libraries; indeed, it might act as an excuse for withholding them.