ness.

The dimensions vary in the different persons within certain definite limits, bɩ do not vary in definite proportions to each other. Taking a certain number of measurements on a certain person, we obtain proportions which answer to that individual alone and to no other. In the eight years in which anthropometry has been practiced no two individuals have been found to have the same me are alike. The measures are constant; the change in the grown person extremely little; the measurements are always and at all times reliable means for identification.

SOME NEGLECTED POINTS IN THE THEORY OF SOCIALISM.

T. B. VEBLEN.

The most important measures are those of the head, its length and width; the length of the middle finger, the forearm, the foot, and the little finger. To be of practical use, the results must be classified. That is done by dividing them into three groups: (1) small, (2) middle, (3) large. For instance, three different sizes of head, the head measured lengthwise, are determined thus: I. those less than 184 mm.; 2. those between 184 and 189 mm.; 3. those which are 190 mm. and

more.

Suppose we have a man before us whom we have measured, and we want to know if he has been before us at an earlier date. We may have to look for his card among tens of thousands. Take the length of his head; it is 187 mm.; this belongs in group 2. We thereby dispose of at least 60,000 cards by putting groups 1 and 3 aside. Take the width of his head and proceed likewise, and we again reduce the number among which we have to search probably thirty thousand. Thus we proceed, and by each measurement we reduce the number of cards we shall have to search to a very small figure. At last, we have only a few cards left, and we know with certainty whether we have measured the man before or not. The whole process takes but a few minutes.

When M. Bertillon had explained the system, he proposed to show us an illustration of its working.

A young man, who was arrested that morning, was called up and measured. The whole proceeding was very like the measure-taking by a tailor. The assistants also measured the man's height, standing and sitting; the length of his outstretched arms, the length and breadth of his ear. When that was done M. Bertillon, holding the card in his hand, asked him: “ What "Were you arrested before?" "No, never!" "Is that true?" "Yes, sir!" As the young man was the leader of a band of thieves his word was not believed.

"

is your name?" Albert Felix."

He was taken out, and we began to search. One row of boxes after another was pushed aside after we had compared their figures with the figures upon the card. At last only two boxes and two cards were left. We took one card. One glance sufficed to show a difference of a few millimetres in some of the measures of the head. It was not his card. We took the last. M. Bertillon covered the photograph upon it. All figures corresponded exactly to those on Felix's card. He was called in again and asked once more. He repeated his former statement, but with less confidence. M. Bertillon removed the cover from the photograph and lo—there stood the original before it. Upon being again interrogated Felix repeated his first story, but broke down. The photograph was shown to him. At first he insisted that it was not his picture, but being told that he was Alfred Louis Lemaire, that he had been in prison for two years, he owned up to the truth. “Yes that is my name. I

knew you would find me."

The most remarkable fact was that not one card among those thousands even approached the measures taken from the young man in such a way that we could be in doubt. No mistake could be made.

The system has been in use in France for eight years, and found to be extremely useful. Russia and other countries have now introduced it, but its complete usefulness will only appear when it shall be introduced into England and America—those two hiding-places for criminals.

"From Freedom to Bondage";* although it is not altogether a criticism of that essay. It is not my purpose to controvert the position taken by Mr. Spencer as regards the present feasibility of any socialist scheme. The paper is mainly a suggestion offered in the spirit of the disciple, with respect to a point not adequately covered by Mr. Spencer's discussion, and which has received but very scanty attention at the hands of any other writer on either side of the socialistic controversy. This main point is as to an economic ground, as a matter of fact, for the existing unrest that finds expression in the demands of socialist agitators.

The most obtrusive feature of the change demanded by the advocates of Socialism is governmental control of the industrial activities of society—the nationalization of industry. The motive of the movement towards corporate action on the part of the community-State control of industry-has been largely that of industrial expediency. Another motive, however, has gone with this one, and has grown more prominent as the popular demands in this direction have gathered wider support and taken more definite form. The injustice, the inequality, of the existing system are made much of. There is a distinct unrest abroad, a discontent with things as they are, and the cry of injustice is the expression of this more or less widely prevalent discontent. This discontent is the truly socialistic element in the situation.

The economic ground of this popular feeling must be found, if we wish to understand the significance, for our industrial system, of the movement to which it supplies the motive. If its causes shall appear to be of a transient character, there is little reason to apprehend a permanent or radical change of our industrial system as the outcome of the agitation; while if this popular sentiment is found to be the outgrowth of any of the essential features of the existing social system, the chances of its ultimately working a radical change in the system will be much greater.

The modern industrial system is based on the institution of private property under free competition, and it cannot be claimed that these institutions have heretofore worked to the detriment of the material interests of the average member of society. The existing system does not tend to make the industrious poor poorer, as measured absolutely in means of livelihood; but it does tend to make them relatively poorer in their own eyes, as measured in terms of comparative economic importance; and, curious as it may seem at first sight, that is what seems to count.

Man, as we find him to-day, has much regard to his good fame-to his standing in the esteem of his fellow-men. This characteristic he has always had, and no doubt always will have. This regard for reputation may take the noble form of a striving after a good name; but the existing organization of society does not in any way preeminently foster that line of development. Integrity and personal worth will, of course, count for something, now as always; but in the case of a person of moderate pretensions and opportunities, such as the average of us are, one's reputation for excellence in this direction does not penetrate far enough into the very wide environment to which a person is exposed in modern society, to satisf-even a very modest craving for respectability.

One does not "make much of a showing" in the eyes of the

* Introductory paper of the book entitled "A Plea for Liberty," edited by Thomas Mackay. See digest of the book, LITERARY DIGEST, Vol. II., p. 550.

large majority of the people with whom one meets, except by unremitting demonstrations of ability to pay. This is practically the only means which the average of us have of impressing our respectability on the many to whom we are personally unknown, but whose transient good opinion we would so gladly enjoy. People, therefore, are discontented, not because they cannot obtain the creature comforts which are in themselves desirable, but because they cannot acquire enough property to impress their respectability on those with whom they come in contact. Hence, the protest against our existing system of society is heard, not from the abjectly poor, but from those who do not habitually, or of necessity, suffer physical privation.

The ground, then, of the unrest with which we are concerned is, very largely, jealousy-envy if you choose; and the ground of this particular form of jealousy, that makes for socialism, is to be found in the institution of private property. With private property, under modern conditions, this jealousy and unrest are unavoidable.

The main object of attack by the Socialists is, of course, private property. Under a system which should allow no inequality of acquisition or of income, the form of emulation which is due to the possibility of such inequality, would also tend to become obsolete. With the abolition of private property, the characteristic of human nature which now finds its exercise in this form of emulation, would logically find exercise in other, perhaps nobler and socially more serviceable, activites; it is at any rate not easy to imagine it running with any line of action more futile or less worthy of human effort.

Under a social order where common labor would no longer be a mark of peculiar economic necessity and consequent low economic rank on the part of the laborer, it is even conceivable that labor might practically come to assume that character of nobility in the eyes of society at large, which it now sometimes assumes in the speculations of the well-to-do, in their complacent moods. Much has sometimes been made of this possibility by Socialist speculators, but the inference has something of a utopian look, and no one, certainly, is entitled to build institutions for the coming social order on this dubious ground.

What there seems to be ground for claiming is that a society which has reached our present degree of industrial efficiency would not go into the Socialist or Nationalist state with as many chances of failure, as a community whose industrial development is still at the stage at which strenuous labor on the part of nearly all members is barely sufficient to make both ends meet.

A NEW VIEW OF THE SURPLUS OF WOMEN. Arabella Kenealy, M.D.

JUS

Westminster Review, London, November.

UST now, when by the recent census returns we have assurance of our great numerical preponderance, it is interesting to inquire whether there can be found therein anything to our advantage. I think the universal opinion is in the negative. Women regard the unequal ratio as deplorable, while many men look upon it as further proof of their own especial value, as showing women to be but the cipher in the world of numbers.

It is known that in nature's economy the masculine element prevails, there being more boys than girls born into the world. Work in the world, the meeting in battle, the going down to the sea in ships, all the dangers of modern living, are incurred in undue share by men, so that the ratio of nature's numbers is reversed.

Yet, now that women are entering every year more freely the lists of competitive living, one reason of our lesser risk of death and our longer life is fast disappearing; but it is unlikely that we shall ever equally share man's dangers, and so there

will continue to exist on our side superiority of numbers. This being true, it is comforting to reflect that distinct benefits have accrued and still accrue to the sex from this surplus it so deprecates.

I cannot persuade my sisters that as individuals we do not suffer, and suffer severely thereby, but as a race we are undoubtedly gainers. The suffering is only another exemplification of the law of nature which sacrifices the individual to the type. This numerical preponderance has brought into woman's life the all-important factor of competitive struggle, so essential to the development and survival of the fittest. In all the centuries past, while man's progress was always stimulated by contact and contest with the world, women must have been left far behind in physical and mental evolution, had not her preponderating numbers, raising difficulties and impossibilities in her marriage chances-then her only plane of existence-forced upon her parents the necessity of developing to the full all the charms and faculties she possessed.

As man progressed, his ideas of womanly possibilities progressed, and his demands had to be satisfied by a corresponding feminine advance. It is not now coarsely confessed that our girls are trained for the marriage-market; yet we must admit that this has been, and still is, the most important underlying object of feminine education. But now that the increasing surplus of women begins to emphasize the impossibility of marrying all our daughters, we are compelled to fit them for professions and occupations whereby they can care for themselves. In this is seen the best possible result of our excess in number. It carries us out into the current of larger and fuller life. Woman now navigates the high seas of existence, and the world is learning to welcome her white sails.

The improved position and education of women are almost entirely due to their numbers. Equality in ratio of sexes by practically insuring marriage to every woman would have precluded or greatly lessened the necessity for self-dependence, and her training to that end would not have arisen. The woman who learns that she may nobly win her bread sets an example of attainment which her wealthier sister must follow, unless she is content to be left in the rear of feminine progress.

The matrimonial contest has been an essential impulse in the history of our development, and has by no means always acted unworthily. With the noblest and most womanly of women the ideal of wifehood and motherhood is heartenshrined. To this end she perfects her womanhood, and denies and disciplines her nature. That which in the commercially-minded woman is an unworthy motive, is, with her finer-souled sister, perhaps, the highest instinct of her being; and though she may hunger all her life for the love of husband and child, she yet keeps in her heart a standard of marriage which largely influences her development.

The may I say fictitious?—value which in all ways is set upon wedlock, tends to place this estate upon a pinnacle, and the struggle which must end in the disappointment to many is made a distinct evolutionary impulse to all. The disproportion in the sexes is not conducive to general happiness. It is undoubtedly one of the most potent causes of "failure" in marriage. A man who is not loved is accepted to avoid spinsterhood. But few married women who confess the truth are at all satisfied with their lot; a majority would gladly exchange it for the state of single blessedness.

Let each woman recognize early that she may not marry, and provide herself with some occupation which shall render her more independent of marriage, actually and m ally-independent entirely she may never be, so long as human nature remains what it is--but she will be far happier unmarried and absorbed in the vocation of her choice than she could be if married unsuitably. There is danger, too, from the effeteness of the young men of to-day, that our developed womanhood

will find no men with whom to mate.

THE GERMAN LAW OF INSURANCE AGAINST INVALIDISM AND OLD AGE.

T. E. YOUNG,

A VICE-PRESIDENT OF THE INSTITUTE OF ACTUARIES.

Journal of the Institute of Actuaries, London, Extra Number.

THE

HE law adopted by the German Reichstag on the 23d of May, 1889, for insurance against invalidism and old age, must demand careful attention as one of the most daring social and economic experiments in modern history.

Its many varied aspects solicit and repay the sedulous thought of the philosopher, as a contribution to one of the deepest problems in the evolution of man; of the statesman, as a signal tentative experiment in the compacting of a nation into an intimate and interdependent unity; of the economist, as a bold departure from principles of social condition which had generally prevailed, and as a practical criticism upon the doctrine of laissez faire; of the historian, as a problem in the mode of development of nations; of the moralist, as a contribution to practical social ethics; and of the actuary, as affording him a question which is peculiarly fitted to engage the disciplined thought and experience in which he has been. trained.

In the discussion in the Reichstag it was forcibly pointed out by many members that the intervention of the State subsidy was liable to attach a pauperizing tendency to the Bill, and that the additional indirect taxation requisite would fall principally upon the poorer classes, so that the subsidy, designed as a blessing, might ultimately be regarded by the people as a

curse.

If we image to the mental eye the vast and intricate system which the scheme necessarily involves; the disciplined and coherent army of officials, in opposition frequently to popular views and feelings; the attraction of the capable and intelligent, the gifted and sagacious, from the general community to this privileged class; the consequent impoverishment in intellect, and the higher qualities of service, of the constantly denuded populace; the severe taxation, with its absolute restraint upon popular liberty, popular comfort, popular education in life, popular development in general, popular taste, culture, and civilization, produced by limitation of the requisite means, and of capacity to procure them; the practically illimitable cost of administration; the additional burden of official salaries and pensions to those in place and power; we perceive a tout ensemble which surrounds the picture with a gloomy setting.

The payment of a portion of the contributions by the employers will, I fully apprehend from the teachings of economic history, involve a reduction in the nominal amount of wages, and consequently a further restriction of personal and social life. The employers will obviously seek to transfer a portion of their burden of enforced charges to the laborers' gains: hence reduced wages with higher prices: all acting in combined power against the workman's impoverished condition. In our old poor-law history, the taxes in aid of wages invariably meant a diminution of wages and a degradation of the position of the laborer. Political economy is the teaching of the repetition of effects, when similar causes and conditions exist.

Hence, with augmented taxation and a reduction of the means of life, we shall, I fear, find the prices of the laborers' essentials of life-to omit altogether regard of personal comforts-gradually increasing: so that we obtain the relation of advancing cost and diminishing means of purchase, involving, by restriction of the necessaries of livelihood, defective and inefficient work, and the disastrous enfeeblement of individual enterprise.

Moreover, the law restrains the development of the individual, and consequently of the national, character. Men advance in civilization by toil and patience only.

The social and industrial character and aptitudes are created and nourished by self-dependence and self-action in such spheres as those embraced by this law: by the consequent teaching of successful and painful experience; by the discovery of more effective modes of combined action and enterprise which defective experiments have taught through the discipline of failure, and by that spontaneous adjustment of relations between themselves, which is the distinguishing evidence of a genuine and organic national life. Hence, I doubt not that the advancement of social and national character, the effective educational training of the community by experience of their own labors and sufferings, are seriously imperiled by the wide-reaching nature and minute intervention of this scheme; and the natural evolution of the people to a higher stage of progress crippled and embarrassed. For history is not a mere chronological sequence; it is a chain of causes linked indissolubly with effects, and of effects as now assuming a causal power.

It will, I think, be conceded that the formation of an elevated self-reliance, associated with social justice and regard, constituting in the totality a righteous national character, is the appropriate aim of all institutions which, themselves transient, should universally include in even brighter outline this perpetually imminent issue. And it follows, as a corollary, that all attempts by governments at administrative and executive power which are inconsistent with this fundamental principle, are to be sedulously and unscrupulously criticised before the individual surrenders any additional portion of his freedom.

Government, in its true sense, is simply the body corporate, protecting its constituent members, and so maintaining and expanding the unity they compose: but all excursions beyond the provision and enlargement of equal rights, all processes, therefore, which tend to affect detrimentally the individual, and consequently the national character, are to be judged by a severe and far-reaching standard.

Finally, the scheme creates a strong probability of extended emigration from Germany of the more vigorous and intelligent classes, induced by the financial and social pressure created by the scheme itself.

Ν

MORAL AND SOCIAL REFORMS IN CONGRESS. GEORGE HAROLD WALKER.

Chautauquan, Meadville, December.

IN nothing is the change moles marked than in the line of

temperance. Under the rules of both branches of Congress the sale of intoxicating liquors is now prohibited in the Capitol, but these are not strictly enforced. With the growth of the temperance sentiment throughout the country has come an increase in the number of Senators and Representatives who art teetotallers. The Congressional Temperance Society, founded by the late Vice-President Wilson, continues to hold annual meetings that grow in popularity and interest.

Tobacco and snuff have their adherents in Congress, though the snuff-takers, for the most part, have passed away. As to smoking, it may be said that the habit is not losing ground. In both Houses there is a rule against it during a session. This rule is rigidly observed in the Senate; but not so in the House of Representatives. Speaker Reed, however, made up his mind that if the House had a rule it should be strictly obeyed. He issued instructions to the sergeant-at-arms and his deputies that they request all members with lighted cigars to withdraw from within the bar of the House. At first the smokers demurred, but the protest was unavailing. The Speaker presented the alternative of obeying the rule or abolishing it. It is hoped that the reform will be permanent. Undoubtedly women of the viler classes still exert an influence in the lobby, but they are less bold than they were. gressional home-life in Washington has made a great advance. A far greater proportion of members now bring their wives and daughters with them than ever before, and the control which a good home exerts in the affairs of men in general is not withont its influence upon national legislation.

Con

Civil service reform has done much to improve the morals of Congress. The merit system has now obtained almost complete control of every bureau in the Government service, and the opportunity of baser natures is passing away, Fortunately the danger confronting women seeking Government employment has lessened.

EDUCATION, LITERATURE, ART.

THE INFLUENCE OF THE NORSE UPON ENGLISH
LITERATURE IN THE EIGHTEENTH AND
NINETEENTH CENTURIES.
JÓN STEFÁNSSON.

Nordisk Tidskrift för Vetenskap, Konst, och Industri, Stockholm, Sjätte Haftet.

WHE

WHEN Torfæus, Bartholin, Ole Worm, and others revealed the greatness of Norse antiquity to the English, they immediately recognized their consanguinity. Under the Latin dress they beheld the strong muscles and sinews, and saw the characteristics of self-confidence and independence.

Already in Dryden we perceive the northern influence. In his Miscellany (1694) is a poem “The Waking of Angantheow," which, though it abounds in faults, and is so modernized that it is really a literary curiosity, is a translation from the Norse.

Thomas Gray (1716-71) felt the influence of the fresh strength, that comes from the Old. In some of his minor poems we find that romantic renaissance and naturalism which came to full ripeness towards the end of the century, and by means of O. Verelius's "Index Linguæ Veteris ScythoScandicæ sive Gothica" (Upsala 1691) he spells out some old Norse poems. Old Icelandic or old Norse was unknown at that time outside of Iceland. In Scandinavia it was called Scythian, in England Runick. The majority of educated people considered it a kind of cabbalistic outcrop of the Hebrew, and connected it with magic and sorcery. Gray called that peculiar language Norse, and it has retained the name in England ever since. From Horace Walpole's letters it appears that Gray was busy with Norse poems as early as 1761. Gray made one mistake in his translations, and though it has been corrected time and again, the English seem never to learn the truth. He translated a certain line in "Krákumál," the death song of Ragnar Lodbrók, "from the foe's capacious skull we'll drink," instead of, "from the foe's round horn we'll drink." Percy followed him in 1763 and it seems still to be believed in England that the old heroes drank beer and mead out of the skulls of their enemies.

The close of the century is the beginning of the age of great poetry. The relation of that new poetry to the old Norse is best defined by Southey. In the "Quarterly Review for January, 1827, he writes: "Gray's translations of Runick poems made a strong impression upon the new generation of poets." Percy's translation of Mallet's book, his Northern Antiquities," strengthened the impression. The poets at once show this influence. They transferred their enthusiasm from the classical heroes to the Northern, to those of Valhalla. Southey is perfectly at home in Norse mythology, and so were probably his friends Coleridge and Wordsworth. All those literary historians, who find the roots to the English romantic school in Percy's "Reliques of Ancient Poetry" overlook entirely the Norse influence. Southey talks further about a collection of poems, from Devonshire and Cornwall, treating old Norse subjects. Among the authors, he mentions Miss Seward and Mr. Polwhele, and a Mr. Hole "whose Norse poem was as pretentious as Glover's Leonidas in its time." All this shows the extent of interest taken in the Northern antiquity.

But the most earnest Scandophile" was Dr. Sayers, of Norwich. After him followed Walter Savage Landor as the English representative for Northern literature. His story, "Gunnlaug and Helga." was published in 1805 and is the Gunnlaug Ormstunga's Saga retold in rhyme. In powerful, but hard verses, Landor tells the Northern “Romeo and Juliet" story. It was only a “tour de force,” the impulse to which came from his friend William Herbert, who also was a "Scandophile."

Byron, Shelley, and Keats were but little interested in the Northern poetry. But Walter Scott embraced it with the same warmth as that of his native country. He understood the masterly storytelling and character delineations of the Sagas. He has retold the Eyrbyggja Saga in his own way, and published it in " Illustrations of Northern Antiquities" in 1814. Scott has evidently made a kind of preliminary study of the Icelandic Saga writers. He has been to school with them.

Long after Scott many of the Icelandic Sagas were translated by Laing, Dasent, Head, and William Morris. In the latter the Norse takes the supreme place and completely overshadows all other influences. It is a phenomenon, because it is so rare in the latter quarter of the nineteenth century, and must be spoken of to some extent.

Never has an English author been so permeated with the spirit of the Sagas and Eddas as William Morris. He lives and breathes in their atmosphere. He would like to change the present day to Saga times. Morris's Icelandic period begins after the publication of "The Life and Death of Jason" (1867). He has translated, in company with the Icelander Erik Magnusson, several Sagas. The translation is faithful, but rendered in such antiquated English that modern readers find it very difficult to read. At present he is publishing a Saga Library, issued by the antiquarian Quaritch. The first volume has just been issued. Morris's main work is " The Earthly Paradise (1868-70) in four volumes. It resembles the "Canterbury Tales" to some extent, It does not contain any lyrical passages, but the tone of the Sagas pervades it. The great characters of the Saga, such as that of Gudrun, are not elaborated sufficiently. There is only one now living poet who could characterize Hallgerd, and that is Algernon Charles Swinburne. He might have painted a Gudrun, and a Brynhild.

""

Morris's description of Icelandic landscapes are picturesque, and true to nature. He has been on the island and seen it with his own eyes. But his besetting sin pursues him. He uses antiquated words and forms. His next great work is The Story of Sigurd the Volsung and the Fall of the Niblung." It treats the subject of the Volsung Saga; its sources are the Saga of that name and the Elder Edda. It was published in 1877, in four volumes. It is written in pure English. The whole work is majestic, and cast in epic grandeur; it is imposing like Milton's "Paradise Lost.” But it lacks warmth and that passionate fire, which burns in Wagner's Tetralogy on the same subject "Ring des Niebelungen."

In 1888, England lost one of her finest literary critics, Matthew Arnold, who was also a poet. One of his best poems. is " Balder's Death," a subject taken from the Younger Edda. His verse is more elegant and more carefully chiseled than that

of Morris.

R. Buchanan's and Aytoun's translations of Norse poetry are full of merit. Aytoun's reproduction of Regnar Lodbrók's "Death-song" is brilliant.

England's most important ancient poem is "The Tale of Beowulf," but it originated on Scandinavian soil. It is not yet clear where Shakespeare got his knowledge about Hamlet. Shakespeare's Hamlet is more like the Icelandic Amloda Saga than Saxo's story, from which Shakespeare is supposed to have drawn his Hamlet.

England is far behind Scandinavia and Germany in the study of the Norse antiquity. Nevertheless for a thousand years the English have drawn from it.