The Portland daily press., 1895-10-05
LIBRARIES ON sHlPBoARD.
The Literature Supplied for Passengers.
Naval Officers, and Crews.


placed on the American liner St. Paul
The library is a gift of tho city in honor
Of which the ship is named, as was the
case with the admirable library of the
St. Paul's sister ship, the St. Louis. The
ST. Paul's library will comprise about
1900 volumes. There will be reference
library of 100 volumes; the complete
works of Dickens, Thackeray, Scott, Irv-
ing, Lowell, Longfellow, Hawthorne,
Emeron, ParIAman, Motley. Prescott.
Holmes, and Cooper, nearly 800 miscel-
laneous writer's of fiction; 80 volumes of
poetry, British and American; 175 vol
umes of history, beside the historical
writings of the authors whose complete
works are included $50 volumes of biog-
raphy, 100 volumes of miscellany. includ-
ing essays, critical, hum orous, and scien-
tific works, and number of works on
Minnesota. The library is strongly
American, especially in history and biog
raphy. The books are uniformly bound
in what is called full American Russia
leather. On one side of the cover is
stamped the deed of gift, SO to speak, and
on the back is the coat of arms Of the
steamship company.
The library is one of the handsomest
naval or commercial. The library of ssthe
ST. Louis is somewhat larger than that
of the St. Paul. Each steamship has in
addition considerable second cabin
library, and from 800 to 400 works in
French and German. 1t is believed that
these are the first ships to provide a Sec
ond cabin library 1t has usually been the
custom to leave the matter of steamship
library to accident. Some companies con-
tent themselves with applying small
annual sum to the maintenance OF a
library, and requesting passengers to
leave behind them such books as they do
not especially value. A specially selected
library of standard works and current
fiction is rare thing to find aboard ship.
While the American liners are thus
providing books for their passengers. the
Navy Department is fitting out it's new
ships with libraries of size hitherto un-
known. Every ship has usually carried
something that was called library. 1t
varied from two score volumes stored in
some bit of waste place to, perhaps, 25o
volumes, many of them more OF less tech
meal in character. The department is
now purchasing about a dozen ship libra
ries. The size of the library varies with
the size of the ship and its complement
of men and officers. The Maine has in
the ships library between $50 and LOCO
volumes, besides a library almost $50
volumes for the use of the crew. The Naval
Equipment Bureau at Washington charged
with the duty of providing libraries for
these ships, and is locally aided in this
city by an officer at tie Navy Yard, act
ing directly under the Chief OF Equip
ment. The department. issues printed
lists of the library that is to be provided
fer each ship, and these lists are sent to
three or four booksellers for bids. The
contract for furnishing the books is then
awarded to the lowest bidder. The de-
partment has been thoughtful enough to
vary the libraries in the several ships, SO
that officers and men, in going from one
ship to another, will find something fresh
to read. One of the lists of a ships library
includes twenty-five reference works,
some of them extending to eight volumes
nearly fifty works on the naval and
military arts; as many ON naval and
military history as many on the useful
arts: ninety works on the natural scien-
ces; eight or ten on the fine arts; thirty
on sociology; twenty on law and d1plo-
macy; nine on general history and geog-
raphy; twenty seven on ancient history
and geography; twenty six on British his
tory; sixteen on French history; thirteen
on German and Austrian history; eight
on Italian history fourteen on Russian
and Spanish history, forty-four on gen
eral European history and on minor
countries; forty-eight on African and
Asiatic history and geography; seventy
of United States history; nineteen OF
| Central and South American history, and
works on Oceanica and the polar regions
seventy five of biography, travel, and adj
venture; forty-six of philosophy ana re-
ligion, and sixteen on language.
A sample crews library contains few
works of reference. many works Of adven
ture and fiction, q little history, and
perhaps, dozen technical works
Fiction seems to constitute quite two
thirds of the crews library.
The French navy is notable for the ok
cellent technical library to be found Oh
board each considerable ship and TIN
many periodicals of a technical or semi
technical character. The British nav.
and our own have hitherto been weak IL
these particulars.
One of the jokes of the commercial
world has been the vain effort Of yariou
religious societies to provide poor Jacl
with books that he could be persuaded t.
read. Great unopened boxes of such book
have been carried along in the modern
ships year after year. and large sums o
money have been spent by well-meanins
persons in this very Intellectual attemp
to care for the welfare of Jacks soul. 1
is a sort of unwritten law that the docto