Index Catalogue of the Library of the Surgeon-General's Office, US Army

Abstract

THE appearance of these very fine folios year by year for the last eleven years is a very good proof to all lovers of books and collections of books in Europe that they have some sympathetic friends in America who have the will and the power to make one at least of their finest libraries well known throughout the world. Its title as the Library of the Surgeon- General's Office may once have sounded like the name of a collection of musty Blue books tied together with red tape; but, thanks to the energy of its Librarian, Mr. J. S. Billings, which we feel constantly in the monthly publication of the Index Medicus, everyone knows now that it is nothing of the kind, but one of the first medical libraries, if not the first, in the world, containing much more medical literature than is to be found in the libraries of the richer English corporations, the Royal Colleges of Physicians and Surgeons, or of the more learned and active Societies, such as the Royal Medical and Chirurgical Society, or, indeed, in the British Museum or Bibliothéque Nationale. And though the Washington Library is of comparatively recent date, going back only some thirty years, yet it contains a very fine collection of books both of the fifteenth and sixteenth enturies; and at the same time the great difficulty of the maker of a catalogue to a modern library, viz, the immense mass of the newspaper and periodical literature of to-day, has been fairly faced and overcome. During the past year, 287 periodicals have been added to the list of those that are taken in, raising the total number to about 7500, of which at least 3900 are current. The vast aggregate of articles in these are duly catalogued, each under the head of its subject-matter. It is not surprising, therefore, that we should find 8o of these large square folio pages filled in the present volume with entries under the heading Phthisis, 78 under Puerperal Diseases, 67 under Pregnancy, and 56 under Pneumonia. Even as devoted entirely to a lesser matter like the pulse, there are catalogued 150 volumes and 350 articles in periodicals. The care with which the records of the smallest steps ih the past history of medicine have been preserved is shown by the accumulation of twenty-five editions of the “Pharmacopceia” of the Royal College of Physicians of London from the years 1657 to 1851. Under such headings as Psychology, we may see the wide range also of the larger subjects embraced in the Library, for the collection under this heading begins with many expositions of Aristotle, and does not neglect Plato, but takes in also the recent books of modern authors, such as the last edition of Herbert Spencer's “Principles of Psychology” and Tame's “De l'Intelligence.” The eleventh volume of this magnificent catalogue brings us to within measurable distance of the end; from the analogy of lesser works, in fact, it seems probable it may be completed in three or at most four volumes, and will then be a great monument among modern catalogues, and in its articles under subject titles form a most valuable dictionary to all who are seeking a clue to the complete historical study of medicine and surgery.

Index Catalogue of the Library of the Surgeon-General's Office, U.S. Army.

Vol. XI. Phædronus—Régent. Pp. 1102. (Washington, 1890.)