On the north side of the Hall of Inscriptions is a passage leading to the Reading Room, which may be viewed from the entrance by visitors under the charge of the commissionaire. The dome (140 feet in diameter and 106 feet high) is, next to that of the Pantheon in Rome (142 feet), the widest in the world; it was tested and redecorated in 1907. The superintendent's raised desk occupies the centre, and from it a service passage leads into the library; it is ringed round with desks holding the General Catalogue, which, including the Maps and Music Catalogues, is in well over 1000 volumes. The ground-floor shelves are occupied by a large library of reference books, which may be consulted directly by readers; other books are requisitioned by filling up forms. The room has seats for 458 readers, and there is, besides the Newspaper and Map Rooms, a large room, called the North Library, for students of rare books, etc. In 1925 there was a daily average of 571 readers and 1,415,385 books were issued for their use. Applications for readers' tickets (gratis) should be made in the Director's Office or by writing; a recommendation from some responsible person, not a hotel or lodging-house keeper, is required; readers must be not under 21 years of age. A Guide to the Use of the Reading Room may be bought in the Hall; 6d.
The Library at the British Museum contains nearly 4,000,000 volumes, and its shelves, if placed end to end, would stretch for about 60 miles. It ranks with the Bibliotheque Nationale at Paris as one of the two largest libraries in the world; in foreign books it is far the richest. These and older books are provided from a Treasury grant and by donation, while, by law, a copy of every book, newspaper, and so forth published in the United Kingdom must be deposited, on demand, at the British Museum, where it must be accepted and preserved. The University libraries at Oxford, Cambridge, Dublin, the Welsh National Library at Aberystwyth, and the National Library of Scotland in Edinburgh share this right to receive copies of books, etc., without the compulsion to preserve them.
