One of the world’s biggest collections of historic books, pamphlets and periodicals is to be made available on the internet.

The British Library has reached a deal with search engine Google about 250,000 texts dating from between 1700 and 1870.

It will eventually allow readers to view, search and copy the out-of-copyright works at no charge on both the library and Google books websites.

The project will take some years to complete and Google will cover the costs.