History of the Town Library
travel and foreign description, mirror the taste of a wide readership rather than just a few. Henry M Stanley, In Darkest Africa (1890) and William Gifford Palgrave, Narrative of a Year's Journey through Central and Eastern Arabia (1866), are two representative titles, while rarer works are George Mason's sets of engravings, The Costume of China (1830) and The Punishments of China (1801). The horrific nature of these last pictures, we are told in the preface, is outdone by those Mason omitted lest they caused "an indecorous violence on the feelings".
More comfortable is Egypt and Palestine Photographed and Described by Francis Frith, an album of pictures taken on glass collodion negatives in 1857, by the man who went on to establish in Reigate one of the largest publishers of postcards in the world.
The Town Library has been fortunate. It rests in its Victorian premises, an imposing building symbolising nineteenth-century confidence in the life-enhancing function of the book, and it also enjoys the support of Essex County Libraries, a large and by contemporary standards prosperous library service; it makes available books and bibliographical expertise which a small
free-standing library would struggle to obtain. The County Library serves the needs of many readers, from cradle to grave, who perhaps never cross the threshold of the Victorian Studies Centre, and whose numerous demands take a lot of energy to satisfy: yet Saffron Walden's librarians give more time to their exotic asset than we have any right to expect, and one of them is an enthusiastic advocate for it, giving his energies unstintingly. At the same time the Town Library is protected by a Trust which safeguards its core collection against the possible vagaries of local government, so that it will stay in its original premises forever.
Meanwhile, the Town Library has since 1982 enjoyed the support of the Town Library Society, (they might be called 'Friends of' on the analogy of the national libraries and museums). The society plays an important part in the management of the book stock and the Library's other resources, raises money to assist the rebinding and conservation programme, and arranges lectures on subjects related to the collection - and so continues the traditions of the Literary and Scientific Institution. Meanwhile, new readers are being recruited, perhaps notably through local history; the library's holdings on its
