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Caption: Book - 16 Years (Edmund James)
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Libraries and Museums 109 have specialized in certain subjects, such as mathematics, natural science, philosophy, etc. Such special dealers have helped greatly in securing out-of-print books which are so essential in rounding out the literature of a subject. Of course, books have been bought in every sort of way as best they might be secured: through book stores, library agents, second-hand dealers, direct with publishers, and so on. Large selections have been made from catalogs of second-hand books, and frequently a successful long-distance bid at a New York or Boston auction will add a prize to the library. The book trade has been interrupted during the war, in common with all other business, but it is only with Germany and Austria that there has been anything more serious than mere delay. For a time it was possible to obtain books and periodicals from these countries by mail, after freight and express shipments had been stopped. But all imports from Germany and its allies have ceased since May, 1916. Numerous periodicals in all countries, however, have kept up regular publication but often in a greatly reduced size for each issue. The English trade has suffered the least and shipments both by freight and mail have been about normal. An outstanding feature of the library as a whole is its collection of serials, covering not only periodicals, but annuals and reports. In 1911 a list of these was printed which ran to over 7,000 titles. This material is the result of systematic effort covering a period of ten years made in the sound belief that no important research in a subject can be carried on without access to its development as recorded in the accepted means of communication among scholars. It was in 1903 that the first money was definitely assigned for the purchase of "sets," and these form a very significant part of the Library. The general Library has also featured its reference and bibliographical work, with the result of maintaining a working collection of the important tools in these two allied lines. The purchase of the Dittenberger5 library in 1907 and the Vahlen ° library in 1913, together with 13,250 dissertations "Wilhelm Dittenberger, professor of classical philology in Halle University •Johannes Vahlen, professor in Berlin University
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