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This paper describes the software architecture and application of SABRE (Semi‐Automated Bibliographic Research Environment), a novel software tool for bibliographic post‐processing. Sabre is one of the first products to provide a semi‐automatic environment for relevancy ranking of citations obtained from searches of online or CD‐ROM databases. Sabre also contains tools designed to meet the review, categorization, culling and reporting needs of bibliographic researchers.

The final report of the Butter Regulations Committee has now been published and it is earnestly to be hoped that Regulations based on the Committee's Recommendations will at once be framed and issued by the Board of Agriculture. It will be remembered that in an Interim Report the Committee recommended the adoption of a limit of 16 per cent. for the proportion of water in butter, and that, acting on this recommendation, the Board of Agriculture drew up and issued the “Sale of Butter Regulations, 1902,” under the powers conferred on the Board by Section 4 of the Food Act of 1899. In the present Report the Committee deal with the other matters referred to them, namely, as to what Regulations, if any, might with advantage be made for determining what deficiency in any of the normal constituents of butter, or what addition of extraneous matter other than water, should raise a presumption until the contrary is proved that the butter is not “genuine.” The Committee are to be congratulated on the result of their labours—labours which have obviously been both arduous and lengthy. The questions which have had to be dealt with are intricate and difficult, and they are, moreover, of a highly technical nature. The Committee have evidently worked with the earnest desire to arrive at conclusions which, when applied, would afford as great a measure of protection—as it is possible to give by means of legislative enactments—to the consumer and to the honest producer. The thorough investigation which has been made could result only in the conclusions at which the Committee have arrived, namely, that, in regard to the administration of the Food Acts, (1) an analytical limit should be imposed which limit should determine what degree of deficiency in those constituents which specially characterise butter should raise a presumption that the butter is not “genuine”; (2) that the use of 10 per cent. of a chemically‐recognisable oil in the manufacture of margarine be made compulsory; (3) that steps should be taken to obtain international co‐operation; and finally, that the System of Control, as explained by various witnesses, commends itself to the Committee.

A memorandum on the Nutritive Value of Milk by the Advisory Committee on Nutrition appointed by the Minister of Health and the Secretary of State for Scotland has now been published with a prefatory note by Sir Kingsley Wood and Sir Godfrey Collins. The Chairman of the Advisory Committee is Lord Luke, and the members include Professor Cathcart, Sir F. Gowland Hopkins, Professor Mellanby and Sir John Boyd Orr. Its terms of reference are “To inquire into the facts, quantitative and qualitative, in relation to the diet of the people and to report as to any changes herein which appear desirable in the light of modern advances in the knowledge of nutrition.” The memorandum explains the high value of milk as an article of food. Analysis of its composition shows that milk contains protein of high nutritive value, energy‐giving nutrients, the known essential vitamins and many mineral elements and apart from its chemical composition it derived value from other properties such as easy digestibility. Many investigations have been made which justify the belief that the general health of the community, and especially of children, would be improved, and the incidence of disease, including rickets, diminished, if the present consumption of liquid milk, averaging about 0.4 pint per head per day, could be increased to about a pint. Milk has few disadvantages as an article of diet. For infants, after breast‐feeding has ceased, it should form the bulk of the diet, with any necessary supplements to furnish iron and vitamins C and D. After infancy milk is not a complete food but a very important item in diet, particularly for children, who should be given one to two pints a day, and for expectant and nursing mothers, for whom about two pints a day are desirable. Other adults, who need milk especially for the sake of its calcium and animal protein, should have at least half a pint a day. Milk is unfortunately liable to contamination by disease‐producing bacteria and its heating by suitable methods such as pasteurisation has important advantages in making it safe for human consumption from this point of view. Moreover, when milk is treated by heat, little significant change is known to occur in its nutritive properties, and such deficiencies as may be caused can readily be made good. It is therefore reasonable to assume that raw milk incorporated in other cooked articles of diet, such as bread and puddings, retains most of its nutritional properties. The report also calls attention to the degrees of nutritive value possessed by various milk products, especially separated milk. The memorandum is entitled “The Nutritive Value of Milk” and can be obtained (price 3d.) direct from H.M. Stationery Office or through any bookseller.

IT is rare nowadays to discover in the annual or other reports of libraries any reference to current losses of books. There are many sides to this, as to every problem. Formerly it was held that a loss of one volume in an issue of a thousand was a reasonable loss; this our readers know. We do not recall a pronouncement based upon a count of stock and circulation recently. As our pages, and those of other library journals, have shown, the check and control of losses is a really costly business. Nevertheless, as long as we can remember, it has been impressed on librarians that we are custodians of a certain form of public property which we are expected to keep for as long in safety as that property retains its value. It can also be asserted that the discovery of whereabouts in the accounts of a bank a single shilling is missing may occupy hours of staff‐time; it is probably necessary to make it, and this was done a few years ago, and maybe is done now. To pose this problem nowadays, when there is so much else to be done, may be a little tactless. In the present conditions of public regard, or want of it, for the property of others, especially communal property, our eagerness to serve our people without let or hindrance, and the consequent removal of all barriers, wickets and entrance checks even in very busy libraries of large size—are we sure that we are absolved from all responsibility for the care of books?

The High Court judgments in the two appeal cases relating to the sale of cream containing boric acid will be read with considerable satisfaction by those who consider that the protection of the health of the people is a matter of greater importance than the protection of the interests of a trade. In one case the Westminster City Council appealed against the decision of a Metropolitan Police magistrate who had dismissed a summons taken out by the Council under the third Section of the Act of 1875 for the sale of “preserved cream” containing 23·8 grains of boric acid per pound, and in the other the vendors of a sample of “preserved cream” containing 19·7 grains of boric acid per pound, appealed against their conviction under the same Section of the Act by the Kensington justices. In the first case the appeal was allowed and the case was remitted to the magistrate with a direction to convict; and in the second the appeal was dismissed, the Divisional Court, consisting of Justices Ridley, Bray and Avory being unanimous in both cases.