Mr. A. W. Pollard, the Keeper of Printed Books at
the British Museum, contributes an instructive and reassuring article on "The Division of Rare English Books between England and the United States" to the September Transactions of the Bibliographical Society (H. Milford, 5s. net). American collectors are buying up the English private libraries, but, before they began, "the larger half of the important books" had passed to the great public libraries. Thus, of books printed up to 1500, the British Museum and the Bodleian have about 11,000, whereas in the United States there are not more than 6,640. Of the English Sfteenth-century books the Museum has 200 and the Bodleian 108; not even Mr. Morgan nor Mr. Huntington can rival the lesser total. Ninety-five per cent, of the Elizabethan plays known to have been printed are in English public libraries. Mr. Pollard thinks that the American collectors perhaps own more fine copies of post-Restoration books than are to be found in our great libraries, where the books have been handled by generations of readers. But, as ho says, "with such a wealth of editions available for the use of English students, it is surely easy to rejoice that our American fellow- workers, many of whom have made such notable contributions to research of late years, should also have adequate materials on which to work."
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