tion of book-desk in Library of Queens'
College, Cambridge.][309]

It should be carefully noted, when studying this plan, that the distance
between each pair of windows is not more than 2 feet, and that the end of
the desk covers the whole of this space. If this fact be borne in mind
when examining libraries that are now fitted up in a different way, it
becomes possible to detect what the original method was.

I propose to name this system of fittings the lectern-system; and I shall
shew, as we proceed, that it was adopted, with various modifications, in
England, France, Holland, Germany and Italy.

Fortunately, one example of such fittings still exists, at Zutphen in
Holland, which I visited in April, 1894. Shortly afterwards I wrote the
following description of what is probably a unique survival of an ancient
fashion[310].

The library in which these fittings occur is attached to the church of SS.
Peter and Walburga, the principal church of the town. A library of some
kind is said to have existed there from very early times[311]; but the
place where the books were kept is not known. In 1555 a suggestion was
made that it would be well to get together a really good collection of
books for the use of the public. The first stone of the present building
was laid in 1561, and it was completed in 1563. The author of the
_Theatrum Urbium Belgicae_, John Blaeu, whose work was completed in 1649,
describes it as "the public library poorly furnished with books, but being
daily increased by the liberality of the Senate and Deputies[312]."

The room is built against the south choir-aisle of the church, out of
which a door opens into it. In consequence of this position the shape is
irregular, for the church is apsidal, and the choir-aisle is continued
round part of the apse. It is about 60 feet long, by 26 feet broad at the
west end. In the centre are four octagonal columns on square bases,
supporting a plain quadripartite vault. The room is thus divided
longitudinally into two aisles, with a small irregular space at the east
end.

The diagrammatic ground-plan, here subjoined (fig. 52), will help to make
this description clear. It makes no pretensions to accuracy, having been
drawn from notes only[313].

[Illustration: Fig. 52. Ground-plan of the Library at Zutphen.]

There are two windows, each of three lights, at the west end of the room,
and four similar windows on the south side, one to each bay. There is a
fifth window