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The author, who is librarian‐designate of the National Reference Library of Science and Invention, gives an account of the work which has so far been done in preparing for the new library. Various improvements have been effected in the Patent Office Library, which is to form part of the NRLSI. The rest of the paper is concerned with the selection, acquisition, and organization of much extra literature within the British Museum. The principles adopted in planning the public part of the new building are outlined.

To practising librarians and information scientists the Patent Office Library needs no introduction. Nor, of course, do I yet claim more competence than the next to give its history, offer its credentials, and expound its motives. It seems, however, useful to begin by emphasizing three main aspects of its make‐up which seem to me to display the essence of its existence and point the way to its future.

Viscount de L'ISLE: My Lords, I beg leave to ask the Question which stands in my name on the Order Paper.

All items listed may be borrowed from the Aslib Library, except those marked, which may be consulted in the Library.

It is to me a very great honour and a very great privilege that I should be allowed to address you from this particular place this evening. My first connection with Aslib, so far as I remember, was as what used to be called, in the good old days of DSIR, a Visitor. There were two people appointed by DSIR to be watchdogs. One was supposed to know something about the particular organization that DSIR was supporting and the other was not. The first of those was Dr Allibone, and I was the other. Over the years I came to know something of what Aslib was up to—I came to know rather less about what Leslie Wilson was up to—and I developed during those years a very considerable affection and even partisanship for Aslib as distinct from certain other people who were trying to spend DSIR money. That particular connection came to an end because that watchdog job has to pass round from one person to another lest the watchdog should be seduced by those on the spot and become less of a watchdog than a barker the other way. So, after a bit I had to stop doing that and now I am here in this extremely anomalous position. I do not suppose for one moment that it is any personal merit on my part that has landed me in this particular chair. What was obviously in the minds of the inner caucus who run Aslib was that you should get at the Chairman of the UGC; but the Chairman of the UGC neatly side‐stepped from Park Crescent into Bloomsbury and now you have got landed with somebody who is entirely unexpected in his official capacity as your President.

The meeting took the form of an interview in which Professor Hutton answered questions put to him by a panel consisting of Miss M. Gosset, M.B.E., B.Sc., A.R.C.S., formerly Librarian, AERE, Harwell; Mr B.Fullman, M.B.E., B.Sc., F.R.I.C., F.I.M., formerly Information Officer, BNFMRA; and Mr Leslie Wilson, M.A., Director of Aslib.