George Brinton McClellan, Mayor of the City of New York, ex officio. OFFICERS President, Hon. JOHN BIGELOW, LL.D. First Vice-President, Rt. Rev. HENRY C. POTTER, D.D. LL.D. Second Vice-President, JOHN S. KENNEDY, Esq. Secretary, CHARLES HOWLAND RUSSELL, Esq., 40 Lafayette Place. BRANCHES-REFERENCE Lafayette Street, 425. (ASTOR.) CIRCULATION MANHATTAN. East Broadway, 31. (CHATHAM SQUARE.) EAST BROADWAY, 197. (Educational Alliance Building.) Le Roy Street, 66. (HUDSON PARK.) BOND STREET, 49. Near the Bowery. 8th Street. 135 Second Avenue. (ÖTTEndorfer.) 10th Street, 331 East. 13th Street, 251 West. 22d Street, 230 East. 23d Street, 130 West. 34th STREET, 215 East. 40th Street, 501 West. 42d Street, 226 West. 50th Street, 123 East. 51st Street, 463 West. 59th STREET, 113 East. 67th STREET, 328 East. (TOMPKINS SQUARE.) Fifth Avenue, 890. (LENOX.) Near 8th Avenue. (JACKSON SQUARE.) Near 6th Avenue. (MUHLENBERG.) Between 2d and 3d Avenues. Between 10th and 11th Avenues. (ST. RAPHAEL'S.) Near 7th Avenue. (GEORGE BRUCE. Department Headquarters.) Near 10th Avenue. (SACRED HEART.) Near Lexington Avenue. Near 1st Avenue. 69th Street. 190 Amsterdam Avenue. (Riverside. 76th Street, 538 East. (WEBSTER.) TRAVELLING LIBRARIES.) 79th Street, 222-224 East. Near 3d Avenue. (YORkville.) 82d Street. 2279 Broadway. (ST. AGNES.) 86th STREET. 536 Amsterdam Avenue. 91st Street, 121 West. 96th STREET, 112 East. 100th Street, 206 West. 110th Street, 174 East. 123d Street, 32 West. 125th STREET, 224 East. 135th STREET, 103 West. Between Columbus and Amsterdam Avenues. (BLIND LIBRARY.) Near Broadway. (BLOOMINGDALE.) (AGUILAR.) Near 3d Avenue. 156th Street, 922 St. Nicholas Avenue. (WASHINGTON HEIGHTS.) The following table shows the operations of the Reference Department of the New York Public Library for December, 1905, with the corresponding figures for the last six months, as compared with the corresponding six months of 1904: During the calendar year ending December 31, 1905, the number of volumes actually received was 56,374, and of pamphlets, 108,811, of which 14,355 volumes and 31,947 pamphlets were gifts. The number of volumes catalogued was 37,016, and of pamphlets, 40,112. The total number of cards written was 92,316. The total number of readers during the calendar year was 201,227; the number of desk applicants was 160,172, and the number of volumes consulted by these desk applicants was 677,946, not including those used at the free reference shelves. There are now on the shelves of the Astor and Lenox Branches of the Library, available for readers, 685,428 volumes and 270,612 pamphlets. These, with the 543,955 volumes in the circulation department, give a total of 1,499,995 pieces in the whole system. CIRCULATION DEPARTMENT. During the calendar year ending December 31, 1905, the Circulation Department (35 branches) circulated for home use 4,116,750 volumes; the number of readers consulting books from the shelves was 463,246; the number of adult readers was 373,637, the total of readers being 594,119; the number of volumes accessioned was 108, 314, giving a total of 543,955 on the shelves. Circulation branches have increased from 28 on January 1, 1905, to 35 on January 1, 1906, the seven following new branches and new buildings having been established and opened during the year: Sixty-seventh Street on January 20, Port Richmond on March 18, Mott Haven on March 31, Kingsbridge on May 19, One Hundred and Thirty-fifth Street on July 14, Tremont on July 22, Ninety-sixth Street on September 22. A new Carnegie building at 190 Amsterdam Avenue provided a new home for the Riverside branch and the Travelling Library department, the opening taking place on February 16. The most popular books in December, 1905, were (in non-fiction): Roberts' "Red Fox," Howells' "London Films," Walmsley's "Modern Practical Electricity"; (adult fiction): Thurston's "The Gambler," Wharton's "The House of Mirth," Tarkington's "Conquest of Canaan "; (juvenile fiction): Wiggin's "Birds' Christmas Carol," Lang's "Red Fairy Book," Burnett's "Little Princess." ACCESSIONS. Among the important accessions was a file of the British List of Flag Officers covering the period of 1715-1829; our file is now complete from 1715 to 1845 with the following exceptions, 1716-7, 1720-3, 1725, 1729, 1731, 1733-6, 1738-47, 1749-58, 1760, 1768-9, 1840-42. The set is bound in full red morocco and bears the bookplates of William Henry, Duke of Clarence and later William IV. of Great Britain, and of his son Rear-Admiral Lord Adolphus Fitz Clarence. There are many manuscript notes by the Duke, and in several of the later volumes are notes by Gen. Charles Richard Fox, colonel of the 57th foot, written in 1870 and showing that the set had been given by the Duke of Clarence on his accession to the throne in 1830 to his son, and by the latter bequeathed to his sister Lady Mary Fitz Clarence, wife of the General. Additional interest attaches to the set from the fact that the Library already owned a long file of the British army lists that likewise had belonged to William IV. when Duke of Clarence and had probably been given by him to his eldest son, the Earl of Munster, when the navy lists went to the younger son, the rearadmiral. Among the important gifts of the month were:-2 privately printed volumes from Edward D. Adams, "Mechanical and electrical inventions, comprising machinery, mechanisms, movements," by Ernest Kempton Adams, New York, 1900; from Mrs. Gertrude Welde Arnold, 2 copies of a list of books for children compiled by herself and printed at the Marion Press, Jamaica, N. Y., 1905; from Samuel W. Balch, a copy of his "Genealogical chart of the Balch Family of New England"; from the Herzogliches Museum, Braunschweig, the catalogue of its collection of paintings; from several of the Audubon societies of the country, a number of their publications; from the Deutsche Landwirtschafts-Gesellschaft, Berlin, a copy of "Die Deutsche Landwirtschaft auf der Welt-Austellung in St. Louis," 1904; from Mrs. Henry Draper, 49 volumes, 63 pamphlets, 3 maps, and I print, including the "Letters of John Paul Jones," printed from the unpublished originals in Mr. W. H. Bixby's collection, with introductory remarks by Gen. Horace Porter and F. B. Sanborn, Boston, 1905, printed for the Bibliophile Society, with a facsimile of a letter written aboard the "Ranger" in anchor at Quiberon Bay, February 13, 1778, by Jones, arranging for the first national salute ever given the American flag in Europe; from Dr. Arpad G. Gerster, 75 of his etchings; from Joseph Holland, 19 volumes and 62 pamphlets, a miscellaneous collection of periodicals; from Mrs. Mary Swift Lamson, "Records of the first class of the first State Normal School in America, established at Lexington, Massachusetts, 1839," Boston, 1903; from George B. McFarland, Bangkok, "An English-Siamese dictionary," originally prepared by S. G. McFarland, 1865, revised and enlarged by G. B. McFarland, and an "English-Siamese pronouncing |