This section is from the book "Scientific American Reference Book. A Manual for the Office, Household and Shop", by Albert A. Hopkins, A. Russell Bond. Also available from Amazon: Scientific American Reference Book.
The following is a list of the principal Libraries of the world
Library. | City. | No. of Vols. |
Bibliotheque nationale | Paris.............. | 2,602,000 |
British Museum. | London. | 2,003,000 |
Imper. publicnaja biblioteka | St. Petersburg | 1,329,000 |
Konigliche bibliothek. | Berlin. | 1,200,000 |
Library of Congress | 1,000,000 | |
Kon. Hof- u. Staatsbibliothek | Munich. | 1,000,000 |
K. u. k. Hofbibliothek, | Vienna | 900,000 |
Universitats- u. landesbibliothek | Strasburg. | 814,000 |
Public Library | Boston. | 812,260 |
Publicnyj i Rumjancovskij musej. | Moscow | 800,000 |
Public Library - Astor, Lenox, and Tilden Foundation.. | New York City. | 787,700 |
Biblioteca nacional. | Madrid. | 600,000 |
Bodleian Library. | Oxford. | 600,000 |
K. k. Universitats-bibliothek | Vienna | 596,526 |
Harvard University Library. | Cambridge (U. S.) | 575,889 |
Cambridge University Library | Cambridge (Eng.) | 550,000 |
Det store kongelige bibliothek | Copenhagen | 550,000 |
Universitats-bibliothek | Gottingen | 506,814 |
Universiteit bibliotheek | Amsterdam. | 500,000 |
Kon. bibliotheek. | The Hague. | 500,000 |
In 1886 the New York World reported the battle of Majuba Hill in six lines, but so rapid was the extension of news gathering that, fourteen years later, events in the same quarter of the globe were reported to the great American dailies by cable as fully as though close at hand. The destruction of St. Pierre, Martinique, in 1902, by an eruption of Mont Pelee, may be mentioned as an illustration of this tendency.
The cablegrams which detailed that great disaster reached American newspapers by way of Brazil, the Azores and Great Britain, costing the recipients from $2 to $4 per word, with fees for precedence.
 
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