Libraries

The only public library in Funchal is that of the Municipal Council (Câmara Municipal), created by a resolution of 12 January 1838. It began with 193 volumes of the Enciclopédia Metódica, bought from the heirs of the Count of Carvalhal (‘oak grove’), and numbered 2,000 volumes in 1850, 2,096 in 1851, 2,496 in 1863, 10,351 in 1889, 10,812 in 1902, 10,929 in 1904, 11,035 in 1908, 21,641 in 1915, 21,786 in 1916 and 21,874 in 1917. In 1913 the Library received a gift of 9,863 volumes from the British subjects Mr William and Mr Alfredo Reid. These volumes had formed the book collection of the late municipal librarian João Joaquim de Freitas, and the two gentlemen had acquired them for the express purpose of enriching that municipal institution.

In 1863 the Funchal library received 21 crates containing 3,050 volumes from the Depository of the Libraries of the Convents abolished by the Decree of 28 May 1834. Before that it had received a large number of volumes from the library of the Convent of São Francisco (St Francis of Assisi). Most of these last are in a very poor state of preservation.

There are no incunabula in the Funchal Library. As for manuscripts, the only ones held there are the copies of the Nobiliario of Henriques de Noronha and of book 2.1 of ‘Longing for the Homeland’ (Saudades da Terra) by Dr Gaspar Frutuoso, and the originals of the Documentos Históricos e Geográficas sobre a ilha da Madeira by Dr João Pedro de Freitas Pereira Drumond and of the Apontamentos para a Genealogia de diversas Famílias Madeirenses by Felisberto Bettencourt Miranda.

The creation of the Municipal Library is due chiefly to the illustrious Madeiran Sérvulo Drumond de Meneses, who, as president of the Funchal Council, made the most praiseworthy efforts to that end. It opened to the public on 8 December 1838, and its Regulations were published in the newspaper A Flor of the 7th of the same month and year. For seven years the library was run by the secretary of the Council. In 1845 the post of librarian was created, which was held in succession by António Joaquim Teles, Joaquim António de Sá, José Joaquim de Freitas, Carlos Azevedo de Meneses and Adolfo César de Noronha.

The library’s activity is shown in the following table:

Reading in the library Reading at home

Readers Volumes Readers Volumes

Year	Readers (in library)	Volumes (in library)	Readers (at home)	Volumes (at home)
1900	165	218	32	41
1905	495	744	25	61
1910	491	612	56	75
1915	1534	1599	318	496
1916	2,251	2,381	653	910

The library of the former Medical and Surgical School is housed in the building of the Misericórdia Hospital (Hospital da Misericórdia) and comprises some 600 volumes. Of these, 140 were donated by Dr Nathaniel Lister of London, on condition that they should pass to the Holy House (Santa Casa, the Misericórdia) if the school were abolished. The Government approved this condition by a ministerial order (portaria) of the Ministry of the Kingdom dated 17 December 1844.

In 1913 the Government authorised the incorporation of the Medical School’s library into the Funchal Municipal Library (Biblioteca Municipal do Funchal), but the books were never actually transferred, for lack of space to house them.

The Episcopal Seminary has a library consisting chiefly of works of theology, and the English club holds some 4,000 volumes, many of them works about Madeira.

There are also libraries in the barracks of the 27th Infantry Regiment and at the Liceu Central do Funchal (Funchal Central Lyceum, a state secondary school). A private individual, Mr João Eleutério Martins, owner of the Diário de Notícias, possesses the finest known collections of newspapers published in Madeira and of foreign books relating to this island. The Utile Dulci library, housed in a building in Rua do Dr. Vieira, has some 1700 volumes that anyone may read on payment of two centavos a week and a deposit of thirty centavos, which is returned when the borrowed book is handed back.

Some new information must be added to what has been said in this short article. The library of the defunct Medical and Surgical School of Funchal has been incorporated into the Municipal Library, and in recent years many bibliographical items have been acquired, so that the library at present (1938) holds 31,000 printed volumes.

In 1938 daytime reading was attended by 2,304 readers, who consulted 2,480 volumes, while evening reading in the same year drew 2,086 readers, who consulted 2,225 volumes. In that year, too, home reading amounted to 151 readers, who borrowed 313 volumes.

Evening reading, which is arousing considerable public interest, was introduced in July 1934.