The light literature that was the staple of the old-fashioned circulating library will, with the rubbish sternly and drastically sifted out, form a considerable proportion of the stock-in-trade. In the minds of some short-sighted people, indeed, the public library is identified with over-thumbed and dog-eared novels, and supposed to be a purveyor chiefly of books for private amusement at the public expense. The statistics that seem to authorize such a view are misunderstood. Half-a-dozen novels usually take less time to read than does a single substantial work of science, history, or even the other kinds of belles-lettres; and make six times as much show in the record of issues. If allowance be made for this obvious fact, study of the figures will usually reveal that a greater amount of reading having a serious value is going on than of reading for mere pastime. One ought to apply a different kind of calculus; but till a sort of mental foot-pound, a unit of energy expended effectively in self-development, has been fixed, we can merely ask that statistics should be interpreted with a due consciousness of what humane literature is, and with common sense. Over-thumbed novels are no argument against public libraries, but a very strong argument for making sure that the supply of fiction is of the best, and for doubling, quadrupling, and multiplying further the supply of first-rate novels. If there are always enough of these to go round, critics on the one hand and grumblers on the other may be disregarded. The workshop theory, which is on the face of it a sound guide for the development of the reference library, though by no means a complete statement of its functions, applies also to the lending department. On the one hand, this should minister to our recreations and our æsthetic and spiritual needs; it will be well-stocked with excellent novels, the best poetry, drama, essays, and humane literature in general. On the other hand, it will cater for the student and serious reader in all branches of knowledge, and will provide all the books it can of general use for industrial and amateur craftsmen, shopkeepers and other business people, and the professional classes. The librarian and the book-selecting committee will have a keen eye for the needs of teachers, journalists, ministers of religion, and all who are in any way intellectual leaders. One healthy consequence of the workshop theory is the rule that a library must never be cumbered with dead stock. Books that have been superseded or have outlived their interest must be ruthlessly discarded. The workshop library has no room for any but live books. Such from the first have been the aims of the great bulk of our public libraries, with, naturally, some laxity here and there, and in rarer instances too much strictness in regard to education and mental improvement or the cult of mere utilitarian efficiency.