The Trustees' Section of the A.L.A., founded in order that Library trustees might gather yearly to discuss their peculiar problems, has always been scantily attended. The Indiana Trustees Association is the only prosperous body of the kind in the United States, but its success might well prove suggestive to library trustees in other states. The three following papers were all read at a single library conference in 1890, which may show that there was then some degree of awakening to the necessity for discussing this phase of library administration. LIBRARY WORK FROM THE TRUSTEES' STANDPOINT A few first principles by the president of the Board of what was at that time the St. Louis Public School Library, since 1893 the St. Louis Public Library. The Rev. Mr. Learned read this paper at the Fabyan's Conference of the American Library Association, in 1890. John Calvin Learned was born in Dublin, N.H., Aug. 7, 1834. He engaged in teaching, went to Missouri in 1856 and in 1859 entered Harvard Divinity School. After graduation he was pastor of a Unitarian church in Exeter, N.H., and in 1870 took charge of the newly-organized Church of the Unity in St. Louis where he remained until his death, Dec. 8, 1893. He was a member of the Board of Managers of the Public School Library from 1884 to 1892 and its president for half that period. An old play has it that "trustees are not to be trifled with" and, as they are not only allowed but invited to come among the librarians to assert their rights and their authority, why should they not do it vigorously? Did they not originate the librarian? "Shall the thing formed say to him that formed it, 'Why hast thou made me thus?'" Yet to assume such creative power must load us down with responsibilities--greater, I fear, than some of us have joyfully accepted. In fact, do not trustees incline, as a rule, to throw too much of the burden of library administration upon the librarian? If the incumbent of this office is fairly willing and capable, is he not suffered to do pretty much as he pleases, except it may be with regard to such large measures as the construction of buildings and the management of investments?