The Village Library Problem. proposal which has recently been made for the establish- ment of village libraries on a national scale to commemo- rate the public services of Mr. Gladstone, seems to have met with a considerable amount of approval, and the Westminster Gazette is to be congratulated on the measure of attention which it has drawn to a question by no means so simple as may be supposed. In the first place, it does not strike us as a desirable thing to establish libraries intended for general use as the out- come of mere political sentiment, nor would the promoters find the public inclined to subsidise any institution which might be claimed as a monument to the public spirit of the Liberal party alone. In the second place, the originator of the idea to give such a memorial to Mr. Gladstone can have made no estimate of the enormous initial cost, nor of the difficulties surrounding the questions of endowment and maintenance. To provide libraries alone, each containing one thousand volumes, for a county with fifty parishes, would cost ^"6,250, so that a thoroughly national scheme would mean an outlay which public subscriptions could never meet. When other important items are added, such as accommodation, fittings, rent, adminis- tration, &c., the sum required to establish libraries of reasonable size and variety of contents in every village of only a few counties, would be found far in excess of what could be ex- pected from voluntarjr sources, while no provision would be made for future maintenance and extension. In these circum- stances, it may be well to regard the formation of village libraries by means of voluntary donations as an impossibility. The question of brightening and restoring the life of our villages and rural districts is, however, one of the most impor- tant to which statesmen can give attention, because on the repopulation of the villages and ultimate return to the country of the surplus inhabitants now congesting every great town and every department of labour, depends the solution of all social problems now being discussed throughout the length and breadth
