, from the solid
brick to the light sheet-iron support; but it is important to protect the
end of every row from strain on the bindings, and the cost of book
supports is indefinitely less than that of the re-binding entailed by
neglecting to use them.

Some libraries of circulation make it a rule to cover all their books
with paper or thin muslin covers, before they are placed on the shelves
for use. This method has its advantages and its drawbacks. It doubtless
protects the bindings from soiling, and where books circulate widely and
long, no one who has seen how foul with dirt they become, can doubt the
expediency of at least trying the experiment of clean covers. They should
be of the firmest thin but tough Manila paper, and it is claimed that
twenty renewals of clean paper covers actually cost less than one
re-binding. On the other hand, it is not to be denied that books thus
covered look shabby, monotonous, and uninteresting. In the library used
for reference and reading only, without circulation, covers are quite out
of place.

Book-plates having been briefly referred to above, a few words as to
their styles and uses may here be pertinent. The name "book-plate" is a
clumsy and misleading title, suggesting to the uninitiated the
illustrations or plates which embellish the text of a book. The name _Ex
libris_, two latin words used for book-plate in all European languages,
is clearer, but still not exact, as a definition of the thing, signifying
simply "out of books." A book-plate is the owner's or the library's
distinctive mark of ownership, pasted upon the inside cover, whether it
be a simple name-label, or an elaborately engraved heraldic or pictorial
device. The earliest known book-plates date back to the fifteenth
century, and are of German origin, though English plates are known as
early as 1700. In France, specimens appear for the first time between
1600 and 1650.

Foreign book-plates are, as a rule, heraldic in design, as are also the
early American plates, representing the coat of arms or family crest of
the owner of the books, with a motto of some kind. The fashion of
collecting these owners' marks, as such, irrespective of the books
containing them, is a recent and very possibly a passing mania. Still,
there is something of interest in early American plates, and in those
used by distinguished men, aside from the collector's fad. Some of the
first American engravers showed their skill in these designs, an