May 23rd, 1846.
MY DEAR SIR,
Notwithstanding the concluding part of your letter of yesterday, which
shall be submitted to the Trustees with the rest of our correspondence,
I think that to find fault with my Department implies a charge against
myself; still more so, as in your second letter you began by
declaring--that my first was, "wholly unsatisfactory,"--that in the time
of my predecessors things were better managed, by their requiring only
the Title of the books wanted by readers, and no Press-mark,--that "your
next complaint" should be to the Trustees themselves; and concluded by
stating that their attention "must shortly be called by the Public, or
by Government, to the difficulties and delay arising from the present
regulations and state of the catalogues, in obtaining printed books."
These are certainly charges, and I naturally expected you would do me
the favour to bring them before the Trustees, so that I might have an
opportunity of proving them groundless.
I am glad that you now give me credit for good intentions; but as you
still consider that "many of my proceedings are detrimental to the
Public, and require to be altered," I shall feel obliged by your
informing me what are the proceedings to which you allude: I presume
that your unfavourable opinion of them is of a _recent_ date.
Believe me, &c.