y, but the
increase in masculine readers of this type has been so much less than
the increase in women readers that in comparison the number of men seems
to have shrunken greatly. Of course much of this reading by women for
culture is desultory and aimless, much is misdirected. But after all
deductions are made, it remains true that the knowledge of books seems
to be tending to become the possession of women rather than of men. It
has always belonged to a certain class of men--not a very large part of
the community--and it is still theirs; but its extension to other
classes has been along female lines rather than male, and its
transmission to the next generation seems only too likely to depend in a
large measure upon the female line. College statistics at present show
the same facts. Language, literature, and art are the chosen studies of
women. Men turn rather to science, economics, or politics--subjects
which, they suppose, bear directly on future plans for life. These great
subjects whose main purpose in education is the uplifting of the mind,
the widening of the mental horizon without direct reference to any
specific line of life--these appeal far more strongly to women than to
men, and their influence, in a rapidly increasing degree, will reach the
next generation through the mother rather than through the father. It
would be a pessimistic view which would say that modern society is
coming to depend on the mothers for the accumulation and transmission of
culture, while retaining in the male line the function of accumulating
and transmitting wealth, though much could be said for the thesis and a
very plausible argument could be constructed for it.

If all this is true, it is inevitable that women should use libraries
far more than men. It is equally inevitable that in this large use much
should be trivial, much customary, much misdirected and unwise. Nature
has no means of reaching success except by the rule of natural
selection--the old-fashioned plan of "cut-and-try," and this means much
failure along the road of advance. We who see the work of the library
from our daily experience know how much it is contributing of culture,
how much of happiness, to the life of women, and through them to that of
the community.

But men--why do they not use the library, say the critics, and what
shall the library do to increase its use by men? You have all read the
vigorous article that the _Independent_ published on this subjec