The development of modern libraries is first illustrated by examples from the United Kingdom, by sketching the history of the British Museum, and other English Government libraries, by outlining the growth of the university libraries of Great Britain, incidentally touching on the libraries of learned societies, clubs, municipalities, and winding up with a section on British library administration. All this is admirably done, and deserves careful reading. The authors suggest several reforms and question some practices. For example, they feel that it would be an advantage from an administrative standpoint if the professional certificates of the Library Association were adopted by the Civil Service Commissioners as a compulsory requirement in addition to their own examination. They evidently favor some form of “registration,” the mooted topic before the British Library Association. The official recognition of a grade of properly trained librarians would in the opinion of these writers tend to improve the methods and efficiency of the government libraries, generally conceded to be behind the municipal libraries in organization and administration. It is pointed out that the reading of fiction in British municipal libraries is much less than commonly believed, being only 24 percent, even after due allowance is made for the reading of fiction in current magazines. Attention is called to the gradual disappearance of the unclassified municipal library, although in 1910 there were over 340 not closely classified, but only arranged in broad numerical or alphabetical divisions. The replacement of printed catalogs in book form by card catalogs and other forms, like the sheaf catalog, easily kept up to date, is noted as growing in favor. The great increase in the freedom of access allowed in lending libraries is considered the most striking tendency of recent years.