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The writer of an article for a professional journal always is confronted with a dilemma: unless he chooses deliberately to be obscure or provocative, he must select a title which is descriptive of the substance that follows, and at the same time he is not without obligation to keep the title within the limits of a title. The title of this paper is a compromise. Under it I shall assemble information on the policies with respect to microfilm and microfilming, the planning which precedes filming and the administration of the result, actual operations, the administration of microfilms and services connected with them, together with something of the historical background for the present.

In this paper the author concludes the review of the British Library on the completion of its first decade which began with the Spring issue of LR. He writes not as executive director of the Centre for the Book in the Library of Congress but as an individual contributor setting down his own perceptions.

THE last ten years have seen a remarkable revival of interest in cataloguing in the United States. As late as 1935 the veteran cataloguer, J. C. M. Hanson, was complaining that cataloguing no longer attracted the same attention as the financial, sociological, or even mechanical aspects of librarianship. A few years later the situation had completely changed, and since 1940 the problem of cataloguing has become one of the chief subjects for discussion amongst American librarians. The immediate occasion for this revival of interest was the publication of the preliminary edition of the American revision of the Anglo‐American code. Work on this had begun in 1930, but for the first few years the work of revision was left entirely to cataloguers and treated as a matter exclusively of technical and specialist interest. Then, just before publication of the preliminary edition, as an American cataloguer ruefully remarks, it occurred to some administrators and a few cataloguers that the time was ripe for a review of the whole of current cataloguing theory and practice.

THE Act of Congress approved by the President of the United States on April 24, 1800, providing for the removal of the seat of government from Philadelphia to the newly created city of Washington, contained a provision for the purchase of books, and “for fitting up a suitable apartment for containing them” for the use of both houses of Congress. This was the origin of the Library of Congress. It is not likely that either Mr. Otis of Massachusetts who introduced the original resolution, nor Mr. Harper of South Carolina who reported out the bill from the Committee on Ways and Means, had an idea that they were laying the foundation of one of the greatest libraries of the world.

Some of the recent activities and publications of the British Library in London and the Library of Congress in Washington are outlined. These are reviewed in the context of the aims of national libraries and of the current policy climates in which they operate.

This paper traces the development of the US/MARC and UK MARC formats from their origins to the present day, showing some of the divergence between them and illustrating how Library of Congress records have been converted to UK MARC by a continually changing program. Some explanation is included of how the divergence occurred, which may be seen as typical of the ways in which national MARC formats have developed and the ensuing need for international formats is highlighted.