Mr. Jones: I agree strongly with Mr. Biscoe. I think the number of volumes, size, etc., range in properly with the date, while the contents should come afterward and range in with such matter as critical or descriptive notes. Ordinarily you want those parts that I speak of first, then your contents, like any other kind of descriptive or explanatory notes.
Chairman: Mr. Biscoe's position appears at first sight very solid and plausible but there is nothing in it. The reason for this is that there is only a small class of books that will call for a contents note. I deprecate mentioning any institution, particularly The John Crerar Library, but that calls for contents notes probably as often as any, and I should like our cataloger to answer if he knows about how many cases run over on the second card.
Mr. Josephson: We have printed so far about 25,000 cards and the number of titles that run over to second cards is considerably below 1000; it is nearer 500 than 1000.
Mr. Jones: I should like to ask the chairman whether in foreign bibliographies we do not find that the data, as to volumes, size, etc.—called the collation—always come first. Should not we be setting ourselves up in opposition to other catalogers if we put the collation after the contents?
Chairman: Possibly that it so; but if we gain a truth, what then? Tradition is powerful, but it is not all. Sometimes it is very little indeed. And this is one of the cases in which I believe it is very little.
Mr. Fletcher: I hold in my hand one of the sample cards which have been distributed, which has this arrangement. That represents what we now call the old practice, which we are proposing to depart from—Cutter's Rules say that the imprint, strictly, is place, date and form of printing; and then goes on to say that for practical purposes the imprint is considered as being enlarged so as to contain not only place, date and form of printing, but also publisher, number of pages and number of volumes. It seems to have been agreed some time ago by the Committee on Rules and the Publishing Board that it was wise to bring back the imprint to the old idea of giving the place, date and form of printing and publisher. It was also pretty generally agreed that form—or size as we now call it—number of pages and number of volumes, and anything else that might describe the book from an exterior point of view, should be called collation—we have not exactly agreed it should be called that—and that this should be put in a statement by itself in smaller type, after the title and imprint, the imprint being printed in the same type as the title and even completing the line the title ends on. Now the question is whether that line of smaller type should be printed immediately after the title and imprint or whether it should follow contents; that is to say, whether contents (called "contents" and not "contents note") should not be attached immediately to the title—which is Mr. Hopkins's idea, I understand, as he thinks logically it belongs there. The card I have in my hand has contents occupying four lines, because while it is one volume it contains four different lectures. That brings before us the "contents note" and the other notes. Now I understand the new proposition is that the collation should follow the contents note, but precede other notes.
Chairman: The thing I want is that the contents note should follow the title. I called it "contents note" merely because it appeared in the smaller type with the other note.
Mr. Fletcher: I wish to express my preference in accord with Mr. Jones and one or two others, that the collation note should continue to occupy the place it has always occupied, of immediate juxtaposition with the imprint, and other notes should go below.
Chairman: In explanation, permit me to take the floor again——
Mr. Bowker: Has not the officer of The John Crerar Library given the best argument for placing the collation before the contents? Mr. Josephson has told us that probably the number of cards including contents would be less than three per cent. Why should we not follow the old practice and let the cataloger and the public continue to use the usual thing?