DIGITISED MANUSCRIPTS

Cae) though by a limited class, at all times is attested by the circumstance that almost our earliest records tell of the existence of libraries. We know that a public library was founded at Memphis, in Egypt, some 3000 years ago, by Osimandias, one of the Pharaohs and a contemporary of David ; and Nehe- miah, on his return from Babylonian captivity, founded a library at Jerusalem in connexion with the Temple. In Greece, the most intellectual and refined country of antiquity, in the year 550 B.c., Pisis- tratus endowed Athens, over which he then ruled, with a collection of heroic songs. The first really national library, according to our modern ideas, was established about 1800 years ago, at Alexandria, by Ptolemy, king of Egypt. ‘ Nourishment of the soul’ were the noble words he inscribed on the face of the edifice containing this collection. At Rome, which shortly after that time became mistress of the then civilised world, its Emperors esteemed it one of their chief glories to adorn their capital with magnificent libraries, and the library became an indispensable and highly prized portion of the palatial dwelling of the wealthy citizen. In the fifth century, shortly before the fall of the Empire, Rome boasted of twenty-nine public libraries. I regret to say that the dawn of civilisation and knowledge in this country, and the consequent