How to Catalogue a Library

by Henry B. Wheatley

"38. The works of an author to be entered in the following order:—

"(1) Collected works in the original language.

"(2) Translations of collected works.

"(3) Collections of two or more works.

"(4) Separate works.

"(5) Entire portions of a separate work to follow that work.

"(6) Selections or collected fragments."

This question of arrangement is distinctly one which may be modified according to the special needs of a particular library. It only becomes a question of importance in a very large library, because in a small library the number of entries under one author are not often very numerous. I should take exception to the arrangement of separate works in alphabetical order, because in the case of titles other than those of plays, poems, novels, etc. (which have arbitrary titles), there is little that is suitable for such arrangement, and it is practically no order at all. I should prefer the chronological order as the most useful for reference. In the case of those authors whose works are voluminous, some system of classification of the separate works is needed. Thus Milton's prose works should be arranged separately from his poems.

It is also a question whether translations should not be kept together at the end. Abstracts of the contents of collected editions of an author's works greatly add to the convenience of a catalogue. It is almost a necessity in a lending library, as by this means you can send for the particular volume you require. The adoption of the plan at the British Museum would save a reader from sending for a whole set of books when he only wants one volume. Mr. Parry, in his evidence before the Commission, alludes to this point. He said: "I remember there was one rule as to collected works, that each separate work in the collection was to be expressed upon the title that we wrote, and afterwards printed separately under the collected heading in the catalogue; that was abandoned, I remember, and I certainly thought it was an important abandonment: it was the abandonment, as it seemed to me, of a useful principle; but it was abandoned, I believe, for the purpose of expediting the catalogue; and in all respects we endeavoured as much as possible to shorten our labour consistently with accuracy" (p. 467).

Mr. Cutter deals with this point in his rule 197: "Arrange contents either in the order of the volumes or alphabetically by the titles of the articles." After giving an example, he adds: "It is evident how much more compendious the second method is. But there is no reason why an alphabetical 'contents' should not be run into a single paragraph.

"The titles of novels and plays contained in any collection ought to be entered in the main alphabet; it is difficult then to see the advantage of an alphabetical arrangement of the same titles under the collection. Many other collections are composed of works for which alphabetical order is no gain, because the words of their titles are not mnemonic words, and it is not worth while to take the trouble of arranging them; but there are others composed of both classes in which such order may be convenient."

We have been considering the arrangement of the titles of ordinary books, but here it will be necessary to go back somewhat, and ask what we have to catalogue. We may have printed books, newspapers, manuscripts (including autographs), prints and drawings, and maps. Newspapers may be included with printed books, but the rest must, without doubt, be kept distinct. When these different classes are small, they can with advantage be catalogued separately at the end of the general catalogue; but when any or all of them are large, they must be treated as distinct subjects, and catalogued according to special rules which cannot be given here.

What is a printed book? Some have made a distinction between tracts (or pamphlets) and books; but any definition of the former, intended to distinguish them from the latter, which has been attempted has always failed to satisfy the bibliographer. It is only necessary to imagine the confusion that would be caused in the library of the British Museum if the titles were thus sorted to see the futility of any such distinction. The only excuse for a separate catalogue of pamphlets is in the case of those libraries which possess a large number of ephemeral pamphlets, bound up in a long series, and kept distinct. Here, as the pamphlets are only occasionally required, it may be found unadvisable to fill the general catalogue with uninteresting entries. It may be supposed that the last remark, as recognizing the existence of a pamphlet, is contradictory to that which goes before, but it is not really so. There is no doubt of the existence of a something which is undoubtedly a pamphlet, but there is no rule by which some other small book can be distinguished as a pamphlet or not. The special characteristic of a pamphlet does not entirely consist in the number of pages, for books in which the most momentous discoveries have been announced have been made up of few leaves, and it does not entirely consist in the importance or otherwise of the subject.

There is one class of pamphlets which gives the cataloguer much trouble, viz., Extracts from Journals and Transactions. If these are catalogued without any indication that they are excerpts, readers of the catalogue are misled into the belief in the existence of separate books which were never issued. At the same time the catalogue is unnecessarily enlarged if the full particulars as to the title of the journal from which the pamphlet has been extracted are given. If there are many of these titles it will be well to adopt some sign, such as a dagger, at the beginning of the title to indicate the character of the pamphlet.

When we have decided to arrange in one general alphabet the titles of ordinary books, both those whose authors are known and those which are anonymous, we are still left with a large number of books which are different in character from ordinary books. We then have to decide how to deal with journals and transactions, ephemerides, observations, reports, etc. These classes of works are generally kept distinct, but are included in the general alphabet as academies or transactions, periodical publications or journals. In the case of comparatively small private libraries, there is no need for the separation at all, as these seldom contain many journals or transactions; but if it be advisable to make the distinction, I think the balance of advantage is on the side of keeping the class outside the alphabet, chiefly for the reason that inner alphabets are confusing and disadvantageous.

There are two main reasons in favour of the separation of serials, periodicals, or whatever other name we may give the class. The theoretical reason is, that they are not like other books, and that the rules for one will not apply to the other. It is agreed, on all hands, that MSS. should be separated from printed books, and yet a MS. is often more like a printed book than a journal is like a distinct treatise. I mean that in the one case the difference is merely one of production,—print or writing,—and in the other it is a structural difference of the mode of composition.