been put in merely to swell the number; all were evidently sent on account of their intrinsic value. For many years after, a few books appear to have been purchased for the library from time to time; but the number thus procured bore a small proportion to the whole. The College was without the means of making such purchases. The first catalogue of the library was published in 1743; the whole number of volumes at that time was two thousand and six hundred. In 1766, President Clap estimated the whole number at about four thousand. During the Revolutionary War, as has been already narrated, the students were for some time dispersed in the country, and the library was sent for security against the incursions of the enemy, partly to the towns where the several classes were stationed, and partly to other places. It is supposed that many books were lost at this time ; as, in the catalogue of the library published in 1791, the whole number of volumes is but two thousand and seven hundred. that period, purchases have been regularly made, so that the number of books in the library at the present time exceeds twelve thousand. In the departments of Law and Medicine the library is deficient: but this is made up in the Law Department, by the well-furnished private libraries belonging to the gentlemen who give instruction

Since

in Law; and in the Medical Department there is a library of medical books belonging to that branch of the institution. The College library is best furnished in theology, and in the sciences; and is most deficient in classical and general literature. In classical literature, the private collections belonging to the gentlemen in that department make up to them, in a good measure, what is wanting in the public library; and in general literature, there is a valuable substitute in the libraries of the several literary societies, among the students.*

The room which contains the library is over the College Chapel. This apartment, for some years past, "besides being unsafe in respect to fire, and inconvenient of access, has been too small to receive the additional books which might have been purchased with the income of some small permanent funds devoted to that purpose. The literary societies of the students have also accumulated libraries amounting in all to more than twenty thousand volumes, for which no adequate and safe accommodations are provided. In these circumstances a few friends of the College commenced a subscription to erect a fireproof building for the libraries. The subscription

Prof. Kingsley.

was raised to thirteen thousand dollars, when it was judged impracticable to obtain a larger amount till the commercial difficulties of the country should begin to be relieved. But that what had been pledged might not be lost, it was determined by the Corporation of th College, with the consent of the subscribers, to commence the building, and proceed in it so far as the amount subscribed would carry it. The walls and roof have accordingly been raised and nearly completed; and the work, we understand, is to be suspended for the present, after a single apartment shall have been fitted up for the temporary reception of the books belonging to the College. library.

"This is a wise economy. Undoubtedly thirteen thousand dollars might have erected a building sufficiently ample to afford a present accommodation for all the libraries of the institution. But in erecting an edifice which is to stand for centuries, and in which room must be found to accumulate not only what may yet be collected of the literature of the present and of former ages, but the countless volumes to be produced by future generations, it would be bad policy to regard nothing but present accommodation. For the institution to involve itself in debt, for the sake of completing such a structure, would indeed

be folly. A debt thus incurred would be paid with the greatest difficulty. But if the Corporation stop, as we understand they are determined to stop, at the limit of their actual resources, then, though the building should stand unfinished for a quaer of a century, posterity will find no occasion to regret the greatness of the plan. The building itself, even unfinished, is a pledge that hereafter the enlargement of the library is to be a leading object with those who have the direc

tion of that institution.

"The view before us presents the east front, which faces the rear of the well known line of College buildings. The west front is upon the street which bounds the College-square in that direction; and the great west window looks directly up a new street, opened within a few years past, and to be opened still farther. The position which it occupies is equidistant from the two extremes of the line of College edifices; so that the library will hereafter be, as is fit, the central thing in the whole establishment.

"It is hardly necessary to add a description of the building. The ground plan and the view tell the whole story, except what relates to dimensions.