about the worst place in the Union for a mechanic to try to make a living. A number of unemployed men drifted into the rural counties or the Northern forests or into Arizona, where a great railway was in course of construction. Some returned to the East. By degrees the surfeit of labor was thus relieved, and early in the eighties the equilibrium was restored. timidly, then more confidently the workmen began to demand the old wages; their demands were acceded to. Then the labor element proposed to intrench its position by organiza

tion.

First,

The discrepancy between the market value of skilled labor in California, and its value elsewhere might be accounted for if the cost of living were higher in the Pacific than in the Atlantic States. But, in fact, it is less. Food of all kinds is abundant and cheap; and, on the whole, the costs of living are lower.

One is lost in admiration of the ingenuity with which, under these circumstances, the labor organizations of the Pacific Coast have defeated the operation of natural laws, and maintained wages so high above the Eastern and European level. It is one of the most astonishing incidents in the history of industry-one of the most brilliant triumphs that organized labor ever won. The monopoly was established in the teeth of almost insurmountable difficulties.

When the labor unions undertook to establish that monopoly, and to prevent competition in the market reserved for their own members, they had to guard against three risks: an influx of labor from the Eastern States, a flood of labor from China, and a fresh supply of labor from their own natural increase. These three dangers the unions clearly discerned, and guarded against them with marvelous skill.

The Eastern door of Californian labor market was, in the first place, barricaded by literature. The Pacific Coast unions made it their business to saturate the East with letters and articles going to show that California was no place for a workingman. Every union in the Atlantic States was supplied with accounts of the suffering of unemployed men in San Francisco in 1878, and was left to infer that the situation was unchanged. The spread of these reports, added to the cost of the journey, indisposed most workmen to cross the Rocky Mountains. If there were any who were not to be deterred they were subjected to other treatment. They learned, on arrival, that they must belong to a union in order to get work, and, when they applied for admission to a union, their case was considered from the point of view of their numbers. If there were a large number of them, or if they seemed likely to be the pioneers of a migration, they were quietly told that there was no room for them on the Pacific Slope; that they had better return whence they came-at the cost of the unions, if they "broke." Stories are current of savage assaults made on

were

Eastern mechanics who moved to the Coast and persisted in remaining there, contrary to the advice of the unions.

The next step was the passage of the Exclusion Act against the Chinese. The only then remaining peril was the growing generation-the sons of the members of the unions. To maintain wages effectively the young men must be barred out, like the Eastern mechanics and the Chinese. The Miners' Union originated the measure which rendered the proposal feasible. They adopted a by-law that the rate of pay for underground men should be $4 a shift, regardless of age, experience or ability. The other unions promptly followed the example, restricting the number of apprentices to one or more to each shop. The machinery which has been described accomplished its work, and defeated the operation of natural laws. It was a wonderful feat, a victory which reflects credit on the cunning of its authors.

THE OVER-PRODUCTION FALLACY.
URIEL H. CROCKER.

Quarterly Journal of Economics, Boston, April.

T was asserted by Mili in his Principles of Political Econ

sider "how a market can be created for produce, or how production can be limited to the capabilities of the market,” but that economists have only to study "how a sufficient production may be combined with the best possible distribution." The proof of the correctness of this position is based by Mill on the alleged impossibility of "general over-production"; on the impossibility of the existence at any time "of a supply of commodities in the aggregate surpassing the demand."

This question of the possibility of general over-production may be reduced to this form: Is it possible that there should exist at any time an over-production of one or more products, unless there is at the same time a corresponding under-production of some other product or products?

In examining this question we shall pass over the somewhat complicated arguments by which Mill and others have endeavored to show that general over-production is not possible, and shall offer an argument by which we think it can be shown affirmatively that general over-production is possible. For the purposes of this argument, we lay down the following proposition:

If, at any time, there is a production of a commodity not based upon and strictly proportioned to the adequate demand for it, but with the knowledge of the producer, in excess of that demand, then there may at such time be an over-production of that commodity, and no corresponding under-production of any other commodity. In other words, there may be, in such a case, a general over-production.

In proof of this proposition, we will suppose that all producers are divided into two classes; namely, class A, which produces only in order to meet the adequate demand for its products, and class B, which for special reasons knowingly produces in excess of the adequate demand for its products. Must there necessarily be at the same time an under-production of the products of class A? Clearly not. In order that there should be such under-production, either the adequate demand for the products of class A must increase, or the production of those products must diminish, to an extent greater than any diminution of the adequate demand for them. But the fact that class B has begun to lose the profit arising from its own production (by glutting the market) cannot cause the adequate demand for the products of class A to increase, but will rather cause that demand to diminish. And certainly there is nothing in the misfortunes of B to increase the adequate demand of class A for its own products. Therefore we may conclude that there is nothing in the over-production of class B to increase the adequate demand for the products of class A, and although the conditions may result in a diminution of production in that class, such diminution being only proportioned to the

diminution of demand, would plainly not cause an under-production. We thus reach the conclusion that there may be an over-production not accompanied by an under-production; or, in other words, that there may be a general over-production, provided that it be possible that there should, at any time, be a production not proportionate to, but knowingly in excess of, adequate demand.

Now, we know very well that many kinds of machinery with an excessive capacity of production have actually been created in recent years, and as a familiar result there is no adequate demand for all their products. Some of the producers must shut down, or all of them submit to reduced profits if not to a loss. But stoppage itself involves a loss, a certain and very serious loss, and producers, realizing this, continue to produce with the full knowledge that there is no adequate demand for all their products. Hence we reach the conclusion that there may be an over-production without any corresponding underproduction, or in other words, that there may be a general overproduction.

With Mill's doctrine of the impossibility of general over-production, falls, by his own admission, his whole conception of Political Economy, and we are required to adopt what he calls "a radically different conception of that science." We are forced to recognize that it is a part of the duty of the economist to study a subject from which Mill wholly excluded him; namely, "how a market can be created for produce, or how production can be limited to the capabilities of the market."

Most of the suggested remedies are worse than the disease, but two of them are worthy of our most careful attention. The one is to increase the consumption of 'uxuries by the poor, the other, a reduction of their hours of labor; or, if we can effect a combination of these two remedies whereby the poor shall both enjoy more, and labor less-shall have more to enjoy and more time for enjoyment-a good result will surely be accomplished.

SIBERIA-THE RUSSIAN PRISON.

FR. STUCKENBERG.
Tilskueren, Copenhagen, March.

PART II.

T was the law of 1853 which was so terrible for all the

I deported, and the cause of much unnecessary misery. It

was abrogated April 17, 1863, and all corporal punishments, accompanying deportation, were abolished, but by the new law of that date, deportation was firmly established and fixed as Russia's main punishment for crime. It is not likely that it ever will be abolished, though it has already undergone changes in details.

The law of 1863 promised a definite settlement of Russia's confused criminal jurisprudence, but once again social and political conditions frustrated all efforts in the direction of a settled law-system and created circumstances which more or less nullified the law. In 1861 all serfs were liberated. The act of liberation necessitated an increased use of the deprivation of freedom as a substitute for corporal punishments. As a consequence all prisons were soon full, and Siberia became the dumping-ground of the overcrowded prisons. Crime and vagabondage increase. Some relief was found when, in 1872, the silver mines of Nertschinsck in the Amoor district were reopened, and when in 1875 Japan ceded the island, Saghalin. Fresh hope was also entertained when, in 1879, a general administration was established for Russian and Siberian prisons. At its head was placed Galkine Wraskoy. Before that time all transportation of peasants and deportation of prisoners to Siberia had been in the hands of the administration of the Marine, which of course did not care for the prisoner as a workman. The new administration will no doubt bring order out of confusion, though, of course, circumstances may, as before, disturb the best laid plans.

Since 1858 the means of transportation have been changed.

Up to that time the prisoners marched on foot, and almost always over poor roads, in cold and snow, or in excess of heat, in clothing unsuited to the season, loaded down with iron, and rarely allowed to rest themselves. Many prisoners marched a year or two before they reached their destination. Their food they usually begged on the road. It is estimated that 6 per cent. of the transported died. Nowadays railroads, navigable rivers, and wagons are employed. Before 1858 detachments were sent off at all seasons; nowadays only in the summer. The prisoners are collected in central prisons. In Moscow is such a prison for 2,000, but in 1890 it contained between 3,000 and 4,000, distributed in numbers of 100 and 200 in a room, all idle; many being kept there from September to May.

The Russian law since 1845 distinguishes between criminal and correctional punishments. With the first follow the deprivation of common human rights such as property, family, etc. When a person is convicted under a clause of the first law his heirs take immediate possession of his property, and his wife can get a divorce. He is civilly dead. There are two kinds of criminal punishments: transportation to Siberia to hard labor for a definite period; and deportation to Siberia without obligation to labor, viz.: an exile, with strict orders not to leave the locality. The third kind of punishment is relegation, or judicial banishment, not by the courts, but by the commune. When a person is under correctional punishment, and considered a bad character, the commune can vote his relegation, and a twothirds vote determines the case. When a person is thus relegated he is sent at public expense for five years to West Siberia. At the end of that time he can settle in any commune in Russia he wishes, but he usually remains in West Siberia, which is a fruitful country, and has a good climate. Such people form the main element of Siberian colonists in those parts. All the deported are now sent to East Siberia, the country between West Siberia and the Amoor land. All the "transported" became "deported" at the end of their term, viz.: they live from their own labors, and are only obliged to procure a passport for the change of settlement. At the end of ten years they can travel anywhere in Siberia, but they can only return to Europe on being pardoned by the Emperor. As free colonists in Siberia they are no longer subjected to any supervision; they may start any business, and can always find work in the gold mines in the Transbaikal.

As regards the first mentioned category, those criminally punished, and regularly transported, they constitute in many ways the most interesting social problem. Lansdell gave, in 1879, their number as 2,500; Kennan, in 1885, as 1,800, both giving the number at Kara only; but many of this class are at Nertschinsck and on Saghalin. Their treatment is not so barbarous as described in novels. Both Lansdell and Kennan have seen them at work. Less is known about the prisoners on Sakhalin, where only Lansdell has visited. The following is based upon his reports, and those of Komorsky, as given to the French Prison Society, spoken of before:

It seems to be a generally established belief that those prisoners who behave themselves well are as well off as any in a European jail. It must also be remembered, that the common Russian is accustomed to much dirt and poverty in his daily life, hence he does not feel the dirt of the prison, but is oftentimes better off than at home. This, of course does not apply to those from the higher grades of society. They suffer in Siberia by the promiscuous throwing together of prisoners. Only the sexes are separated. The food is good, the bread even much better than than of the ordinary Russian peasant. Clothing does not exist in abundance. Disciplinary punishments are limited to seclusion and flogging-as much as 1,000 strokes. Punishments of this kind are not too severe. The governors dare not make them too frequent or too severe, as they fear their own lives, being surrounded by prisoners. The common trouble in all Siberian prisons is lack of work, from which results disciplinary transgressions, and the numerousness

of prisoners compels the overseers to leniency. Lansdell said, and Komorsky has indorsed his statement, that a man's daily work in the mines at Nertschinsck is no more than a healthy man can do in two hours. Kennan said that the work in the Kara mines was from 5 to 7 in the summer and 7 to 5 in the winter.

Since 1883, all women sentenced to transportation are sent to Saghalin. At present they comprise there 20 to 30 per cent. of all prisoners. At the end of their terms, they may marry, and little by little they are restored their civil rights, excepting their property, which, by law, is already in other hands. If a free man marries such a woman, he must never leave the land, and the law is strictly enforced. All males transported, who are accompanied by their wives and families, are sent to Saghalin. According to Komorsky, the number of prisoners at Saghalin was, in 1890, 6,000, and the free colonists 2,300. No revolts are feared. Liquors can be imported by the Governor's permission only, but tobacco is free.

EDUCATION, LITERATURE, ART. HEPHAISTOS AND THE SMITH OF ZÜTERBOGK. ADOLF VOIGT.

Zeitschrift für Vergleichende Litteraturgeschichte, Berlin,

HE

April.

[EPHAISTOS sent his mother Hera, who had banished him ignominiously, a golden throne, artistically furnished with invisible chains. Immediately she sat down in it she was bound, and no one could free her, until Dionysius came to the rescue, and sent back the artist and his merry comrades, in joyful procession to Olympus, to release her. This little practical joke of the Gods was rendered familiar to the Greeks in the poetry of Sappho, Alkaios, Pindaros, and Epicharmos. It was represented in the Temples, and also on the vessels of Hephaistos's art which were devoted mainly to the service of Dionysius. According to Preller's interpretation of the fable, it is Hera, the Goddess of the air, whom Hephaistos chains—the hot glare of summer controls the heavens, so that not a breath of air stirs. In spring, when the pleasures of Dionysius are freely indulged in, and Hephaistos rakes his fires, the air also recovers its strength and its clouds. There is universal activity above and below, and the merry brothers of heat and of wine return to Olympus.

According to this view, Hera is bound in summer to be released in spring; that is to say, there is not a breath of air from summer until spring; a very painful state of affairs for Hera, and hardly substantiated by the airs beneath the Grecian skies.

Moreover, against this and all other accepted interpretations we have to oppose the question—What is the relation of the fettering of Hera to the fettering of Ares and Aphrodite in the marriage-bed, similarly furnished with invisible chains? Did the idea of the invisible chains originate independently in both stories as an allegorical representation of the same, or different natural phenomena ? or do they stand to each other in the literary relation of original and imitation? In neither case is it admissible to assert an allegorical meaning in the one case, and not in the other.

The groundwork of both the stories is the capacity of the divine master of the smith's art to forge invisible chains, and thereby fetter and capture whom he will. In one case, the exercise of this talent enables the deceived husband to capture the violator of his marriage-bed; in the other case, it enables the outcast son to revenge himself upon his mother. Accordding to the laws of Gertyn, the injured husband who catches his rival in the act "shall, in the presence of three witnesses, notify the relatives of the bound man to release him in five days." To this end the first thing necessary is to catch the sly thief; and what could be so admirably adapted to this end as the invisible Hephaistos chains? These invisible chains

are materialized wishes or ideals of lawful owners for protecting them from the inroads of thieves. Adultery and burglary were placed in the same category. They were both inroads. on the rights of property, and both redeemable by a fine. Why this magic power to protect property from theft should be ascribed to the god of blacksmiths is not difficult to conceive. To the ignorant, Art always partakes somewhat of the nature of magic. In an age of the world in which every man had to do everything for himself, the first art which emancipated itself was the working in metals. The labors of the primeval divine blacksmiths are miracles and witchcraft, the Hephaistos chains, magic traps formulated as wishes. I do not recall any direct evidence from antiquity of a belief in a magic spell that would bind the intruder, and hold him helpless until he who set the trap should come to loose him; but if we institute a comparison between the German hold and loose legends, and the fables of wizards who studied this art, we find that the stories are essentially the same as those that were told of the Greek gods. We may therefore venture to conclude that long before the Demodokic poem was composed, stories were told of the wizard arts by which the clever and initiated were able to bind and loose their enemies-as Sisiphus chained death-unfortunately we know not how. The dramatization of the Hephaistos legend is certainly a poet's phantasy which, in antiquity, precisely as in our age, infuses the inherited material with new life. The folk-lore tells stories, the poet fits personages into them-the highest poetry is that in which nations recognize pictures of their own national life. These personages which are regarded as real because they are recognized as pictures of national life, are called mythic. The Odysseus myth, for example, was a treasure lying silent in the depths of the popular heart until the poet of the Odyssey embodied it in song. According to one view, the Odysseus myth is deep-rooted in primitive religious. conceptions, and the poet of the Odyssey was the organ of the popular soul, in which capacity he elaborated the crude ore, until out of it he had forged the glowing metal.

GERMAN NOVELS OF THE PRESENT DAY.
MR. LEVY-BRUHL.

Revue des Deux Mondes, Paris, March 15.

HE novel occupies, in the literature of the present time, a place which is already considerable, and is constantly increasing in importance. It amuses, it instructs; when necessary it preaches. It is the most active instrument for the propagation of new ideas. By means of it, philosophical and scientific theories reach-often deformed-the great mass of the people. Its power is due to the number of those who read it. A novelist who has attained celebrity counts his readers by hundreds of thousands, and even by millions. As soon as he has published a new book, foreigners seize upon it and translate it. The work of a quite unknown writer, if it succeeds, is quickly read throughout the world. This was the case with Robert Elsmere, three years or so ago, and of Looking Backward, some months since. The success of these books in America was immediately followed by an equal success in Europe. Now, among the novels which are thus spread over all the reading surface of the globe, from Asiatic Russia to South America, there is no German work. The novels of Germany do not pass the frontiers of that country. Outside of it they are naturalized with difficulty. How many English novels have become part of the general reading of France-I do not mean for young girls only, whose severe education forbids almost all novels but English, but for the great mass of the public? It suffices to name Walter Scott, Thackeray, Dickens, Bulwer, George Eliot, and instantly a number of familiar figures start up in the mind. Their books, doubtless, are not classics, but they are at least known to and beloved by everyone.

German novels have not had the same good fortune. A

certain number of them have been translated into French. Not one of them has yet found its way to the general reading public. Not one of them has taken a place among those books which readers never tire of perusing. To these German productions, not English novels alone, but even Russian and Norwegian are preferred. In a word, the German novel is not, as they say, an article for exportation. Germany, on the other hand, imports a great many novels from foreign countries. The demand is active, the competition between publishers is lively, and everything from abroad with an established reputation, is immediately translated and immediately read.

Nevertheless, there is no lack of production in Germany. There appear every year, in that country, a great number of novels, fewer, doubtless, than in England or France, but more than sufficient, if the one quarter of them only were good. Yet the flood of mediocre and common-place works does not discourage the German reader. He keeps on reading the stories written by his countrymen, always hoping to find something fresh and original, and always disappointed.

Besides, the fabrication of a certain kind of novels has become, in Germany, a trade relatively easy and sometimes, though rarely, lucrative. Women, especially, have acquired great dexterity in this kind of work. In concocting a marketable article, a novel likely to have the advantage of being cut up in the weekly or monthly reviews, they are indisputably superior to German men. The latter do not hesitate to concede the fact. The women are content with less pecuniary remuneration, They have an inexhaustible fecundity, a fertility of invention against which the masculine pens struggle in vain.

Mr. Mielke, a competent German critic, makes a distinction between novels and romances. Novels, he says, are a kind of literary production with a form and laws quite different from those of romances. I do not care to enter here on an abstract discussion in regard to the essential qualities of romances and novels. Admitting a distinction between the two, a glance at literary history will show that the German writers have, in general, been happier and more original in novels than in romances. One reason, among others, of this, is, that the political division of Germany during several centuries into small bits favored the appearance and development of novels. Romances can likewise, without doubt, be used for minute painting of the manners, the intellectual and moral spirit of a corner of a country; but the novel is more naturally provincial or local. It is a sort of water-color, of more modest pretensions, and more familiar character. Every different region of Germany. attached to its traditions, its usages, its dialect, even its prejudices against its neighbors, was bound to have, not only its poets, but its "novelists." The Black Forest has Auerbach, Thuringia has Otto Ludwig, Mecklenburg has Fritz Reuter, German Switzerland has Gottfried Keller. Several of these novelists have excelled in depicting the physiognomy of their country and the indefinable harmony established between the aspect of the land and the soul of its inhabitants.

Critics, in Germany, do not disguise the weakness of their contemporary romance. Notwithstanding awkward eulogies heaped upon such or such a work by complaisant friends, the critics avow, with little hesitation, that German romance of our day does not well bear comparison with English or French romance. It is for this reason that, during some years past, a group of young German romance-writers have, with a great flourish of trumpets, broken with tradition. In their eyes, romance, neither in the latest manner of Spielhagen,-nor, with more reason, in that of Freytag or Auerbach-nor in the new aristocratic and elegant style of Paul Heyse, nor even in the new Berlinese and realistic fashion of Theodore Fontana, respond to the artistic demands of our time. The masters of these young romancers are elsewhere: the names of those masters are Zola, Ibsen, Tolstoi. Dostoievsky, Maupassant, Nothing is spoken of but realism, naturalism, Zolaism. This is a literary revolution which is beginning, or, to be exact,

would like to begin: for so far there has been more intention than accomplishment.

From all this arises an important literary question: Why, with few exceptions have German romance-makers taken foreign writers as models? Why has not Germány, like Spain, like France, like England, her original romances. Precisely for the reasons which have favored the production of provincial novels.

To stop at this explanation, however, would be far from reaching the root of the matter. The fundamental reason is that it is indispensably necessary for every good romancewriter to be, above all, a psychologist. What we demand of romance, as of a drama, is that its personages shall be alive or at least present the illusion of life. The purest products of German genius are in lyric poetry and metaphysics. In this way the inaptitude of German genius for drama and romance is the price paid for its metaphysical faculty. Germany has neither a Shakespeare, nor a Molière, nor a Rousseau, it is because she has a Leibnitz, a Kant, and a Hegel.

RUSSIAN HERO LEGENDS. M. CARRIERE.

Die Gegenwart, Berlin, Band xli., No. 12.

N all Hero legends we find a foundation of original nature

aly We a

old gods and the phenomena of nature, as in man's religious conception of these, the ethical replaces the purely physical; as when the Sun-god Apollo becomes a spiritual enlightener and protector or leader of the Muses, or when a new creed, like Christianity, is accepted. The people will not abandon the old images to which they are attached, and from the Sun-god which split the icy envelope of winter with its rays, and woke the slumbering earth with a kiss, were fashioned the hero Siegfried and sleeping Walküre of the hero legend, and also the prince and the thorn-rose in the fable. So also the Slavic god of light and heaven who gathers the other gods around him, becomes Vladimer, who, about the year 1000 A. D. reigned at Kieff, and converted his people to Christianity, like Charlemagne among the Germans, or Prince Athur among the Kelts. As with this latter, too, heroes of all sorts gather at the round table to recount their deeds and arrange adventures. The religious and historical are fused in one; and with the irruption of the Mongols, the Slavs, driven from their homes, carried their songs northward where they have been preserved, as so many relics of the German songs of the heroic period, have come back to us from Scandinavia, and even from Iceland. In the far north to the confines of Siberia, these old herolegends still pass from mouth to mouth to this day. They have undergone many changes of form in transit, and Indian fables spread by the Buddhist Mongols have here and there intruded, but the original tone is preserved, while with us, customs and views have been influenced by the chivalry of the Middle Ages. But while among Indians and Persians, Greeks and Germans, epic poets have seized on a single deed or hero as a central point around which a mass of poems have been fashioned into an organic whole, neither the Russian nor the Servian has displayed any such genius, although the singer, in possession of many songs, may range numerous heroes in the same connection. So says the Amazonian Anastasia to her husband Dunay:

'Certainly no one ever exceeded Vladimir in good fortune, or Ilja in strength, Alioscha in wit, Dunay in persuasive power, Dobrynja in courteousness, Potyk in beauty, Djuk in riches, Tschurilo in elegance: whenever he walks the streets, the women and maidens follow him. But no one can equal me in shooting. Hold, oh my husband, a ring on your head, and three times successively will I shoot through it without touching it, or disturbing a hair."

The feat was accomplished and the husband was spurred by a desire to emulate it. She implores him not to make the

attempt. In vain he laid the ring on her head, shot her through the heart, and, smitten with grief, threw himself on his own sword. There, where the blood flowed from their hearts, gushed forth two streams.

And so, to this day, in Turgenief's "Sketches of the Hunters," and Tolstoi's "War and Peace," the isolated scenes are more forcible than in a longer composition, or romance.

The tone of the composition is simple and smooth. As in all epic poems we find stereotyped terms: the Kieff castle is represented as the white stoned, the sun, as the clear red, heaven, as the blue, the red dawn as the friendly light, the sword as the steel-glancing, bloody; and, as an echo of the divine myths, the man-loving Prince Vladimir is called the bright sun of Kieff. Comparisons are frequent, but, as in the popular songs, the sentiment begins with the observation of nature, through which the mind is at one with itself because it accepts the phenomenon as the outward symbol of its sentiment, so here, too, the outward object is kept in view, even while it is denied, as a means of introducing the man:

It is not the roar of the blue sea,

It is not the storm in the green forest 'Tis the anger of Ivan, the terrible Czar.

From out of the mountains, from out of the hills, From out of the forest, from out of the dark, Shone-not the glowing purple dawn,

Rose not aloft the golden sun

It was a good knight riding by.

Vladimir does not figure much as an actor; he is the central point around which the heroes revolve; any one may gain admission into their society by valiant deeds. It appears to be a society of god-descended heroes transplanted to eartha society into which men could be elevated by great deeds and suffering. And this kingdom of light stands out in strong contrast to the kingdom of darkness, with its hostile forces of wild giants and evil magicians, and, above all, of the misshapen Koschtscher who robbed the heroes of their maidens, and necessitated their fighting to recover them.

BURIATIC LEGEND.
N. ASTGREW.

Globus, Braunschweig, Band lxi., No. 12.

THE good Buddha an accidentally found the vessel

of the wicked Dokschit filled with all the evil and sorrow which this wicked demon had prepared for the destruction of humanity. Otschirwani had compassion on man, and decided to frustrate the demon's evil intentions. But how? If he concealed the vessel anywhere in the heavens or in the clouds Dokschit would seek and certainly find it—pour the contents upon the earth? That is just what is necessary to carry out the designs of the enemy of mankind. The good Buddha decided himself to drain the cup designed for the whole race. He alone would suffer, that the millions might be happy. He grasped the vessel in his hands, and drained it at a draught to the last drop.

Since then his sufferings have been indescribable. His body became blue with the pains of hell, and burns in eternal fire; his countenance is distorted, and he utters cries of terrible anguish; his arms and legs twist and contort so that he can no more maintain the dignified, contemplative attitude of a Buddha. And yet his self-sacrifice fell short of the full efficacy of his design. He forgot to lick out the vessel; and the enemy of mankind finding it empty scraped the sides, and succeeded in collecting a drop which he at once spilt on the earth. It is this one drop of Dokschit's hell-brew which gave birth to all the sin and sorrow which humanity labors under. But how wicked would humanity have been, and how terrible its sufferings if Otschirwani had not drunk the perilous draught! On account of this magnanimous deed he is worshipped like the other great Buddhas, and called "the good God" in spite of his horribly contorted visage.

G

THEORY OF THE COMMA. American Bookmaker, New York, March.

WOOD punctuation is recognized as a necessity by all writers and printers spend their lives in attempting to elucidate the meanings of the paragraphs which they compose or correct, or in trying to show the grammatical relations of the different parts of various sentences. Neither compositors nor proofreaders, however, are always successful. The words remain, in some cases, without their proper points; the meaning of a writer is not made more clear, and every rule of grammatical construction is violated. How can a better system for the type-setter and his immediate superior be devised?

In the first ages of printing there were only three marks of punctuation—the comma, the colon, and the period. The semicolon, the exclamation, and interrogation marks were added later. Dashes, parentheses, and brackets came last of all in type, although they existed before type. Custom has determined the chief use of each of them. The comma indicates the short pause which happens where an explanatory sentence is begun or ended; the semicolon, when two or more partially constructed sentences are separated; the colon, when the preceding sentence or part of a sentence ends with expectancy, which is to be satisfied with what immediately follows; the period, that the sentence is closed; the parenthesis, that one clause of a sentence, generally explanatory, is within another sentence; the bracket, that what is inclosed has no relation grammatically to the rest of the phrase, but has some relation to it otherwise, and the dash, that the idea which precedes is suddenly broken by the words of another sentence. The exclamation and interrogation marks are self-explanatory.

It is possible to print a page, or a number of pages, of a book, if necessary, without punctuation. If a man wrote as clearly as Cobbett or Washington Irving, there would be no difficulty in finding out what he meant. In Scotland, punctuation marks in printed briefs are omitted because words constitute the pleadings, and the law can take no knowledge of points. The comma and the parenthesis are the two nearest of kin, and can, to a large extent, be used interchangeably. Inverted sentences frequently require, at the place where the inversion ends, a comma, while in a straightforward sentence this might not be required. Other frequent uses are when other nouns or substantive sentences are added to a simple sentence. No punctuation mark is ever required to be used, because there is a stoppage of the voice in a certain place in speaking. Pointing depends entirely upon the grammar, and not in the least upon the pronunciation.

THE CATHOLIC CONTROVERSY ABOUT EDUCATION JOHN A. MOONEY.

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Educational Review, New York, March. DUCATION, to whom does it belong? Rev. Thomas Bouquillon, professor of moral theology at the Catholic University of America, Washington, put and answered this question in a pamphlet published at Baltimore November, 1891. The Reverend Doctor claimed that he wrote at the request of ecclesiastical superiors, though he mentioned no names. Professing to deal only with theoretical principles, and assuming that "education belongs to the individual, physical or moral; to the family, to the State, to the Church; to none of them solely and exclusively, but to all four combined in harmonious working," the Doctor left the practical matter of harmoniously combining these four factors to "the men whom God has placed at the head of the Church and the State." As it happened, before Dr. Bouquillon wrote, several parochial schools were leased to School Boards in Minnesota at a nominal sum, and, ceasing to be Catholic schools, were at once turned into public schools. Seemingly, this change was effected with the consent of the Archbishop of St. Paul, who has expressed himself as favoring Dr. Bouquillon's opinions.

The parochial school is the ideal Catholic school. American