re profitable (in dollars) to live in; because it
enables the intelligent and studious to earn more.

Second in importance is the supply of books to those who wish to acquire
or pursue an education, or to complete or continue a knowledge of
general literature; and, third, the accommodation of students working
out special lines of research.

Fourth. Such is the more solid usefulness of a public library. The rest
of its distributing work, whatever its intrinsic usefulness, is at least
as indispensable, and is always numerically the most popular. This is
the supply of light literature to readers for rest or amusement. Whether
books of this class constitute one-half the library or (as in this one)
one-tenth of it, it may be depended on that from one-half to four-fifths
of all the reading done will be done from that part. The justification
of the supply of such books by a free public library is, that it is
important also, if not likewise, to afford mental relaxation, as it is
to feed mental effort; that even light reading is a very important
improvement over and safe-guard from street life and saloon life; that
such books introduce to a more useful class of books by forming the
habit of reading; and that the public, who pay for the library, choose
to have books of this sort as much as, if not even rather more than, the
more useful sort.

Fifth. There is another department of usefulness for public libraries,
quite unknown until within a few years, which makes them actual and
vital members of the public-school system, and additionally justifies
the term "People's Universities," which has often been applied to them.
This is the arrangement at the library of courses of illustrative study
and reading for teachers or pupils, or both. A series of such books as
relate to one or another part of the school course is laid out at the
library; the teachers, and perhaps sometimes one of the higher classes,
examine them along with the librarian, and such information as they
afford is used to fill out and illustrate the outline in the school-book
for the fuller information of the pupils.

This practice is perhaps easiest in history and geography. It is easy to
see how a capable teacher could intensify the interest and enrich the
minds of a class about the geography of the East Indian archipelago, by
introducing them to the vivid narrative and abundant illustrations of
Wallace's most entertaining and instructive book on that region. How,