A BAN ON--BOOKS

"About 297 books were missing from the Reading Room at the mid-year period. . . . Sixty-seven have been returned or have been located, etc. . . . A careful examination would show that more than 230 are now missing from the Reading Room."

The above statement, received yesterday from the Library authorities, is not unusual. The undergraduate is becoming used to having the most important book in any given course reported as "missing" --and, what is infinitely worse, is becoming used to the existence of dishonesty and inbred lack of any sense of fair play. In fact, the stealing of books has been going on for so long that it has hardly any effect any longer --except for a slight pinch during examination periods. And so much ink has been spilled over the question that it seems useless to discuss it any further. When things reach such a stage, editorials, individual professors, and the members of the Library staff can do nothing. Even the recommendation of the Student Council that the names of all book-stealers be posted publicly has had no apparent effect.

Where it will end it is impossible to say. A not improbable suggestion would be to put a ban on all books in the Library--not allow them out of the building; with probation or dismissal as the punishment for offenders. A less stringent regulation would require the satisfactory identification by officials of every book leaving the Library doors. Each of these rulings would mean that every individual would have to submit to a search every time he used the Library; and actions, in most cases, have been known to "speak louder than words".

While these remedies may sound radical, they are not beyond the bounds of reason. Present conditions cannot be allowed to continue--and to grow worse. If there are men in the College who are of the type that have to be watched continually, the rest of us are, or should be, more than willing to undergo inconvenience and a slight personal indignity in order to weed them out . . . Or, as a last resort, the Reading Room could he closed entirely. The Stacks are still there; and it is better to have no Reading Room at all than to depend upon it, only to have it so grossly abused.