ascertain dates; but my return
being uncertain and having just now a little leisure, I will endeavor
to recollect and write what I can; if I live to get home, it may there
be corrected and improv'd.

Not having any copy here of what is already written, I know not whether
an account is given of the means I used to establish the Philadelphia
public library, which, from a small beginning, is now become so
considerable, though I remember to have come down to near the time of
that transaction (1730). I will therefore begin here with an account of
it, which may be struck out if found to have been already given.

At the time I establish'd myself in Pennsylvania, there was not a good
bookseller's shop in any of the colonies to the southward of Boston.
In New York and Philad'a the printers were indeed stationers; they sold
only paper, etc., almanacs, ballads, and a few common school-books.
Those who lov'd reading were oblig'd to send for their books from
England; the members of the Junto had each a few. We had left the
alehouse, where we first met, and hired a room to hold our club in. I
propos'd that we should all of us bring our books to that room, where
they would not only be ready to consult in our conferences, but become
a common benefit, each of us being at liberty to borrow such as he
wish'd to read at home. This was accordingly done, and for some time
contented us.

Finding the advantage of this little collection, I propos'd to render
the benefit from books more common, by commencing a public subscription
library. I drew a sketch of the plan and rules that would be
necessary, and got a skilful conveyancer, Mr. Charles Brockden, to put
the whole in form of articles of agreement to be subscribed, by which
each subscriber engag'd to pay a certain sum down for the first
purchase of books, and an annual contribution for increasing them. So
few were the readers at that time in Philadelphia, and the majority of
us so poor, that I was not able, with great industry, to find more than
fifty persons, mostly young tradesmen, willing to pay down for this
purpose forty shillings each, and ten shillings per annum. On this
little fund we began. The books were imported; the library wag opened
one day in the week for lending to the subscribers, on their promissory
notes to pay double the value if not duly returned. The institution
soon manifested its utility, was imitated by other towns, and in other
provinces. The libraries w