in type
of this size were issued by the recipients of the circulars. In six cases,
the answer included brief lists of from two to twelve titles of large-type
books; and in several other cases, the publishers stated that the labor of
ascertaining which of their publications are in large type would be
prohibitive, as it would involve actual inspection of each and every
volume on their lists. In two instances, however, after a second letter,
explaining further the aims of the collection, publishers promised to
undertake the work. The final result has been that the Library now has
over four hundred volumes in the collection. This is surely not an
imposing number, but it appears to represent the available resources of a
country in which 1,000 publishers are annually issuing 11,000 volumes--to
say nothing of the British and Continental output. In the list of the
collection and in the entries, the size of the type, the leading, and the
size of the book itself are to be distinctly stated. The last-mentioned
item is necessary because the use of large type sometimes involves a heavy
volume, awkward to hold in the hand. The collection for adults in the St.
Louis Library, as it now exists, may be divided into the following
classes, according to the reasons that seem to have prompted the use of
large type:

1. Large books printed on a somewhat generous scale and intended to sell
at a high price, the size of the type being merely incidental to this
plan. These include books of travel, history, or biography in several
volumes, somewhat high-priced sets of standard authors, and books intended
for gifts.

2. Books containing so little material that large type, thick paper, and
wide margins were necessary to make a volume easy to handle and use. These
include many short stories of magazine length, which for some inscrutable
reason are now often issued in separate form.

3. Books printed in large type for aesthetic reasons. These are few,
beauty and artistic form being apparently linked in some way with
illegibility by many printers, no matter what the size of the type-face.

The large-type collection is used, not only by elderly persons, but also
in greater number by young persons whose oculists forbid them to read fine
print, or who do not desire to wear glasses. The absence of a wide range
in the collection drives others away to books that are, doubtless, in many
cases bad for their eyes. Some books that have not been popular in th