We

happy and worst governed in the world, and that life | saviour of society? Is it not natural that the | believed, since he is not even able to preserve in such a country is a perfect plague. That this is not citizens of Berlin, suddenly aroused from slum-public order at his palace doors. the case we, of course, are well aware; but would it not be better if discontented persons were to shake ber, should hail the Kaiser, riding through the the dust of Germany from off their feet, retiring as streets, as the paladin of order? We repeat soon as possible to some country where such a miser- that the remarkable fact about these scenes in able, wretched state of affairs does not exist? They will thus reap advantage to themselves, at the same the streets of Berlin is not their character and time doing us a great favor. duration, but that what are greatly to be feared are their consequences, the origies of reaction. New York Volkszeitung (Socialist), Feb. 27.-It is an unquestionable fact, and the occurrences in Berlin have proved it, that the revolutionary now so strong that a peaceful solution of existing difficulties is impossible. The disturbances in Berlin are the first mutterings of the storm which threatens society. The political air is charged to such an extent with electricity that an explosion is unavoidable. How long will it be before the storm breaks?

We live in a state of transition. Germany is gradually emerging from infancy. She is now about to enter on the period of youth. It would be well, therefore, if we freed ourselves from infant maladies. We live in exciting days in which the judgment of the majority of men is unfortunately devoid as regards objective facts. But quieter days are in store, since our people, now uniting undeterred by the utterances the loyal, solicitous efforts of their hereditary rulers. A firm confidence in the sympathies accorded your work and mine inspires me continually with fresh strength to continue my task and advance in the path Heaven has pointed out to me. I also am impressed with the feeling that what has occurred in the past is due to the hand of our Supreme Lord on high. I am firmly convinced that He who was our ally at Rossbach and Donnewitz will not now leave me in the lurch. He has so constantly aided the cause of Brandenburg and my house that we cannot believe that He has done all this for no purpose. No, on the contrary, we still have a great destiny before us, and I am leading you to glorious days. My course is the right one, and it will be prosecuted to the utmost. I trust my brave Brandenburgers will assist me in my task.

of voices abroad, are putting their trust in God and in

The riots in Berlin on Feb. 25, 26, and 27 grew out of the action taken by a large number of unemployed workingmen, who held a meeting at a brewery, and after unsuccessfully appealing to the Burgomaster of the city to take steps in their behalf, marched to the Emperor's castle. Although the Socialist organ disapproved the riotous demonstrations, it seems to be generally understood that the continuance of the disturbances was due largely to the efforts and encouragement of individual Socialist leaders, and that the chief significance of the rioting lies in the indication that the German Socialists are disposed to act aggressively when opportunity offers. [For the complete text of the platform of the Socialist party of Germany, see THE LITERARY DIGEST for Dec. 5, 1891, p. 24.]

elements are

for manu

PROTECTION IN CANADA. Toronto Grip, Feb. 27.-There is an old sayschool, but fools will learn in no other." ing which runs, Experience keeps a dear do not wish to be understood as even inferentially applying this hard word to the farmers of Canada, though we called up the quotation by way of introduction to a few remarks on the results of the bye-elections. It is true our farmers have been attending the school in question for some thirteen years past, but they have evidently learned nothing, and so cannot be described as fools, for, as the proverb implies, such would have profited by the tuition. They went into the N. P. scheme, it will be reChicago Staats-Zeitung, Feb. 27.-The pre-membered, because they took stock in the sumption of Emperor William, this man of promise held out to them of a home market to mediocre intellect, is really laughable. What be provided by the rise here, there, and everyhe is he owes to the accident of birth. When where of flourishing manufacturing towns. did it ever occur to a ruler to invite all his Their fears of higher prices subjects who did not agree with him to leave actured goods were, in the meanwhile, the country? For a great civilized nation like set at rest by the statement that.comthe German it is truly no honor if a ruler by petition in the home market would keep prices the grace of accident, poor in intellcct and still down to a reasonable level, and such things as poorer in accomplishments, abuses his power possible trusts and combines were waved aside like a school-boy. What is to come of all as the product of overheated imaginations. this? No one knows. The Kaiser's temporary Well, the scheme went into operation, and in its security rests chiefly in the general feeling thirteen years it has produced a few very rich that he and his talk can hardly be taken men-who don't happen to be in the farming seriously any longer. business, by the way. The tall chimneys have not materialized; the home market is not at home; manufactured goods have become dearer; wages have remained as before, if not lower; prices of farm products have not gone up; and instead of the new towns and villages that were to be, our population is virtually smaller than it was in 1882. The fellows who opposed the sophistries on which the N. P. was built waited patiently to see the effects, and when they saw them they turned to the farmers and said, "Didn't we tell you so ?" Then they revived the tune they had harped upon, that it was more freedom the farmer needed, not more restriction; a wider market, not a narrower one. And the farmer, with his depleted pocket and his mortgaged farm-what did he say? After this long course at Dame Experience's school what did he do when he got a chance to express himself? Do? Why, he voted to keep the N. P. in operation!

Chicago Arbeiter Zeitung (Anarchist), Feb. 27.-It is not merely a socialistic disturbance, as the correspondents would have us believe. It is an uprising of the people. Hunger has driven the working people of Berlin to desperation, as is demonstrated by the fact that only the butchershops and the bakeries were looted. It is the people against the King and aristocracy, and the people will win.

Ex-Diplomat," in the New York Tribune, St. Louis Westliche Post, Feb. 26.-During Feb. 28.-Everything goes to show that the outthe couple of years in which William II. has sat on the Imperial throne, anti-monarchical sentiment has made greater progress in Germany than it did during the long reign of his grandfather. The more frequently and vehemently the present autocratic ruler declares his will and seeks to represent it as the only authoritative will, the more violent becomes the reaction of the will of the people, and the more manifest becomes the disposition of the Germans to grow dissatisfied with the present form of government and to feel constrained to effect a revision of their political ideas. The speeches of the young Emperor operate to fructify the seed of Social-Democracy, and it may well be regarded as no mere accident that his recent oratorical deliverance was followed by a powerful demonstration before his castle on the part of those classes who are most discontented with existing conditions, and who from the Kaiser's point of view ought to shake the dust of Germany from their feet as soon as possible. The means suggested by the Emperor for making the German people happy and contented is rude in its simplicity. All the dissatisfied are to leave the country, and all complaints will then be silenced as a matter of course, and the Emperor will rule over a happy people. That plan would cause an exodus such as the world has never seen.

New York Staats-Zeitung, Feb. 27.-The riots in the streets of Berlin are the outcome of one of those demonstrations of the unemployed which of late have been so frequent and as a rule so harmless. During the past few weeks many such demonstrations have taken place, not only in Vienna, Prague, Rome, and other cities outside of Germany, but also in Memel, Koenigsburg, and other places within the Prussian boundaries. That in Berlin, under the eyes of the Emperor, a conflict should have taken place with the guardians of order is a matter for deep regret. Who can be surprised if the young Emperor now really looks upon himself for the first time as the

THE LIQUOR ISSUE.

KINGDOM FOR 1891.

break has been devoid of all political instiga-
tion and object, and that it has been merely
the counterpart of the popular demonstrations
of the unemployed which have taken place
during the past two or three winters in London,
Vienna, Paris, Rome, and in fact in every great
capital. It is in the large cities where the
misery of the working classes is the greatest
and nowhere more so than in Berlin, which
enjoyed a temporary and altogether un-
reasonable boom after the events of 1870
converted it into the capital of the Empire.
The results are likely to prove very grave. In THE DRINK BILL OF THE UNITED
the first place the lawless and criminal element
of the Berlin population-and even the Em-
peror himself confesses that is far larger and
more dangerous than that of any other capital
or great city of the same size and character-
have realized and appreciated the difficulty
which the police have experienced in dealing
with the outbreak, and will not be slow to take
advantage thereof. The more advanced and
active branches of the Socialist movement have
likewise taken note thereof, with a view to
future events. They have seen that for about
forty-eight hours a mob was able practically
to control the streets of Berlin, to loot baker
and butcher shops, and, in fact, to have things
pretty much their own way. That no attack
should have been made on the great banks, on
the palaces of the rich, and on the great jewel-
lers, gunmakers, and silverware shops, fur-
nishes abundant evidence of the truth of the
assertion which I have made above, namely,
that the mob which marched on the castle was
composed of men and women rendered des-
perate by want of work and consequent starva-
tion, whose only object was to appeal to their
"Landesvater" (father of the country) for re-
lief. Henceforth the prestige of the Emperor,
as competent to maintain order and to insure
the security of the lives and property of the
people of Berlin, is gone. Rich and poor, law-
abiding citizens and evil-doers, have seen and
realized that the power and control of the
young monarch is far less effective than was

London Times, Feb. 17.-The total amount spent on intoxicating drinks in the United Kingdom during 1891 was one hundred and forty-one millions and a quarter sterling. This huge sum means an expenditure of £3 15s. per head, reckoning women and children as well as men; or 18 155. for each family of five persons. Comparing the amounts with those presented a year ago, we find, as is generally the case, an increase, amounting this year to a million and three-quarters. England, including Wales, with a population of 29,000,000, consumes spirits to the value of 27,500,000 sterling; Scotland, with a population of 4,000,000, drinks spirits worth £7.500,000; and Ireland, with 4,700,000 mouths, consumes about £5,720,000 worth of spirits. Thus the northern kingdom retains a proud preëminence in whiskey; but England, not to mention the eight millions worth of brandy, rum, and rye whiskey that she consumes, drinks what would seem to be an unfathomable ocean of beer. The amount put down to her is no less than 27,500,000 of barrels, costing the enormous sum of £78,567,673. Reckoned in cost per head, this more than reduces the balance, for it brings the English expenditure to the large sum of £20 75. 6d per family of five, while Scotland pays for drink 16 5s. per famly, and each Irish home of like dimensions succeeds in taking its fill for a cost of £10 115.

Sd. It must be confessed that those seventyeight millions for beer are a figure that it is hard to be proud of. It means that down the national throat there flows enough to provide the country with two navies and two armies, with the Civil Service thrown in-or very nearly so. It means that the beer drunk in one year would pay the interest on the National Debt for three; or that, if funded for nine years, it would pay the whole debt and leave us with no more interest or annuities to pay. Or, from another point of view, it amounts to a probable fifteenth part of the whole national income-that is, everybody in England may be considered to spend six or seven per cent. of his revenue on beer, and twelve per cent. of his revenue on beer, wine, and spirits taken together. There are very few people, except those directly interested in public houses and breweries, who do not agree that this is by far too large a proportion of the national wealth to devote to this one kind of expenditure. Of course, there is the revenue to be considered; and we have to remember that of the money spent on drink a sum of nearly twenty-five millions goes back to the national coffers in the form of excise. Nobody forgets this, least of all the trade.

-

In

"national

The

SOCIAL TOPICS.

ARE THE RUSSIAN JEWS "UNDESIR

64

so vigorously that it will cease to have influence, but if it is true, as we believe it to be, let Christian men, individually and in churches, act consistently with their professions. The Christian Church has permitted its ABLE" IMMIGRANTS? influence upon public morality to be im- Hebrew Standard (New York), Feb. 26.paired by its own apathy, and its own present The Sun pleases to characterize the Russian need is to justify its claims to public confidence Jewish immigrants as "the least desirable and by assuming its leadership in the affairs of hu- the least welcome." It describes them as manity. As simply an amiable foil to the poor, ignorant, and half-starved outcasts.' agencies of iniquity, the Church cannot hold its There is a mixture of truth and falsehood in own in the current battle, but when it gets these characterizations with which an editor ready to smite iniquity, fashionable or un- like Mr. C. A. Dana should not allow his pafashionable, the emissaries of Satan will per to be polluted. The Russian Jewish immitremble and fall back, and victory will be in grant may not be desirable or welcome to some sight. But a duel between the Church and the men of acquired tastes and habits of a descripdevil, with punctilious attention to all matters tion which we would designate as aristocratic; of etiquette, the Church to surrender whenever they may not be welcome to those who take a the devil gets an advantage, is not in conform-greater interest in the consumption than in ity to our ideas of Christian duty in A. D. 1892. the production of wealth. But whether they are undesirable and unwelcome to the prosperity of the land in general from a THE "NATIONALIZATION IDEA. broad politico-economic point of view is a mercy's name, is not the iniquity question which a prejudiced editor is incompeized" too much already? No other business tent to decide. The moral tone of the abject receives such extraordinary privileges. and poor Russian Jew is decidedly higher on manufacture is superintended by Government the average than that of other elements of agents; the Government issues to manufacturersof liquor during the aging period ware- the language and manners of this land, they immigration. "Ignorant as they may be of Leeds Mercury, Feb. 18.-There is a large house receipts, which are practically as good are not ignorant in the general sense of the margin between those who can control their as Government bonds; the local Governments appetites and those who cannot and are drift- undertake to protect the precious business of indifferent to religion, or he would not be term. Not one of them is "ignorant" of or ing further and further into the currents flow-retailing liquors by the same system adopted to compelled to emigrate from Russia; the mere ing into the terrible whirlpool where all is lost, protect the preaching of the gospel, perform-confession of the Russian faith would rehabiliand whose indulgence is in the main wasteful. ing the marriage ceremony, teaching in public tate him in the estimation of that accursed It would be well if the publication of this schools, and the practice of medicine-licensing Government, and would open for him resources annual drink bill served to warn all who are in candidates who pass certain tests of reliability, of a comfortable living in all the realms danger of the terrible peril in which they capability, and good moral character. It is of the Czar. stand. Unfortunately-though it is, we hope proposed to go further. The liquor business is and believe, true that there is a steadily in- to be taken in hand and operated like the postal creasing number of abstainers-we go on system and the common-school system, by the increasing the total of our drink bill. It is Government itself. The retail dispenser of very sad that this should be so, for it demon- rum, gin, and whiskey is to be made an officer states that, notwithstanding the growth of the in the civil service, to be revered as the Govindividual conscience, there is a continual ernment's representative. It seems scarcely transgression of the line of safety, and of credible that such an idea could be seriously descent into the regions of wretchedness and entertained by an intelligent citizen who has despair. had a chance to observe the effect of alcohol from the fashionable table down to the lowest grogshop. How many more years before we Bombay Guardian, Jan. 23.—The following shall learn that the harmfulness of liquor is in figures, says Abkari (extracted from the An- "the nature of the beast" and not in the way nual Statement"), show the terrific and steadily he is harnessed?-Northwestern Christian Adunchecked increase in the consumption of in-vocate (Chicago), Feb. 24.

THE EXCISE REVENUE IN INDIA.

toxicants in India. Tne totals of the Excise and Customs Revenues of liquor and drugs consumed in India during the past twenty years compare thus, in sterling = 10 rupees:

1870.

1872..

1875.

1878..

1881.

1883.

1884.

46

..2,533,000 ....2,604,000

1885...
1886..

4,415,000

Exactly doubling itself in twelve years. The Statement" endeavors to explain this alarming increase away in the fashion usual to Excise apologists, by attributing it to growth of population, the general increase of earnings, and improved Excise administration. The latter reason is, no doubt, the real one, the official notion of improved administration being that of stimulating the sale to the utmost for the sake of revenue, regardless of all moral considerations. We wonder what sort of talk there would be in Britain if the Government at home had, by bad laws and worse administrations doubled the consumption of liquor in twelve years!

and sturdy adherence to the faith of his And this knowledge of desirable here in comparison with the imancestors makes the Russian Jew rather migrants of other nationalities. He is possessed of none of those brutal instincts which exalt prize-fighting to a virtue, which make cock and dog-fighting matters of sport, pleasure, and enjoyment, and which by their degraded outgrowths give so much trouble to the police and furnish so many inmates for the prisons. He is imbued with none of the bloodthirsty sentiments which produce a "vendetta," a

Mafia," and other secret societies of the kind

that incite murder and cover the tracks of assassins. And he comes here to "stay in the land and to feed himself in righteousness,' and not to amass American wealth and carry it away to his native land. Is such an immigrant undesirable and unwelcome" in a general sense of the term?

THE PRESENT STATE OF CIVILIZATION IN CREEDE.-Creede, the new mining town, outstripped Leadville and Butte in lawlessness and debauchery. It is at night that one fully 4,572,000 appreciates Creede. The saloons and dance4,865,000 houses are in full blast. The dance-halls are THE INDIAN OPIUM TRAFFIC. 5,062,000 about fifty feet long and fifteen wide, with pri- The Lancet (London), Feb. 20.-The contro1889.. . . . . . . . . . 5,253,000 1890............5.451,000 vate boxes attached. The women that sing versy respecting the Indian opium traffic still and dance are old, and widows. These halls goes on much after the manner of any artillery are filled with intoxicated men. As a rule they duel at long range, and so far without any defihave lost all their money at the gaming-table. nite result. A comparison of the arguments There is no place where they can get a room to used on either side is nevertheless instructive. sleep, and in consequence they make these On the part of the Indian Government we are resorts their headquarters. When a fairly well- met with an unqualified denial that the opium dressed stranger enters he is generally com- habit is decidedly on the increase in the counpelled to_set 'em up at the point of try under its rule, even among those classes or a gun. Everybody wears a belt which in- in those localities where it admittedly prevails, cludes a dirk and gun. Drunken men come and by an assertion that it is effectually held in out of saloons and discharge their weapons check by legal restriction. At the same time in the air. In the largest hotel one registers, we are told that opium smuggling tends to pays for his bunk, and receives a numbered develop into a regular trade-a fact which check. Every one sleeps with his clothes, at all events does not strengthen confisatchels, hat, and shoes under the quilts. The dence in the decline of the habit. The revolver is generally kept ready for action. opposite side of the question was lately Sometimes a drunken miner enters the room presented to the public of this country and insists on sharing the bed. THE CHURCH'S BUSINESS. In that case in a letter by Mr. Donald Matheson, in which one is compelled to look wise and say nothing. he criticises the position and arguments of the Our Country (Boston), Feb. 27.-Rev. Dr. The scenes about the Rio Grande depot are non-interference party. The Government of Parkhurst of New York, in his recent pulpit indicative of the business of the town. One India, he reminds us, is more than a merely attack upon the official agents and servants of freight train of eighteen cars arrived on Thurs- regulating authority. It holds a strict monopiniquity in that city, used these words: "To day. Twelve cars were devoted to bar fixtures oly of the trade in opium, is at once the strike at iniquity is a part of the business of the and liquors, and the balance to lumber and grower, manufacturer, and vender of the drug, Church; indeed, it is the business of the edibles. An undertaker has just opened an and he is naturally disposed therefore to view Church." Has not the time fully come when establishment, and soon he expects a flourish- the question of its use and abuse chiefly from a men fully believing themselves to be Chris- ing trade. Two banks have been opened. commercial standpoint. He points out that a tians should cease to play "fast and loose Their best patrons are the "tin-horn" gam- statement that the opium consumption is as yet with the proposition stated by Dr. Parkhurst ? blers.-Dispatch from Denver, New York Sun, small in comparison with the population of the If his position is not true, let it be repudiated Feb. 28. Indian Empire really furnishes a strong argu

revenue.

traffic cannot be effected without serious dislo

"Robert Elsmere "

ment in favor of prohibition, inasmuch as it
shows that the evil, if early dealt with in this
way, may still be effectually extirpated. Fi-
nally, he quotes the authority of a declaration
made by upwards of five thousand medical
practitioners of the United Kingdom to the
effect that the opium habit is morally and
physically debasing, and that the drug it-
self should therefore in India, as in Eng-
land, be classed as a poison and sold for
medicinal purposes only. Nothing could be
simpler or more scientifically accurate than
this presentation of the subject. Thus
much even the Indian Government may fairly
be expected to concede, and we cannot doubt
London Academy, Feb. 13.-It may be-and
that it would do this and support the admission as a matter of fact it is absurd to speak of
by practical legislation, but that there come in
the rival interests connected with usage and which is exclusively or even mainly theologi-
as a novel the interest of
We can all appreciate in some de- cal. Cut out all the polemics, and leave the
gree the resulting difficulty of its position, but principal situations to stand alone, with a mere
this is no reason why the work of reform so
minimum of theological scaffolding, and it will
greatly needed should be neglected. It remain a singularly moving and impressive
remains to be seen whether a process of reduc-work of creative art. Still, though the theol-
tion, gradual if not rapid, in this injurious ogy of the book did not impair the genuine-
ness of its human interest, it undoubtedly nar-
rowed its range. The great crises of the story
were provided by experiences which, though
natural enough in themselves, are of a kind
with which ordinary men and women are un-
familiar. They are rare exotics of life, not
everyday indigenous products; and, while the
imaginative power of the novel did much to
veil its essential aloofness from the sphere
of common sympathies, the aloofness was
there all the time. It is not absent even
from "The History of David Grieve," but it
is not so conspicuously present as to give a
character to the work. The new story is
more human than the older one, not because
it is truer to life at this point or that, but
because at so much greater a number of points
it appeals to common experience and comes
home to men's business and bosoms.
No stage in the development of the central
character is devoid of attractiveness, and the
novel is rich in felicities of detail. Whether it
detracts from, maintains, or augments the
reputation won by "Robert Elsmere " is a
question the answer to which depends almost
entirely upon the point of view. That it is a
novel into which Mrs. Ward has put work
which is exceptionally strong, truthful, and
fascinating, is hardly likely to be seriously
denied by any critic who can claim to speak
with authority.

cation of present fiscal arrangements. Meanwhile we regard it as an obvious duty to maintain toward it an attitude of opposition, of which we may say that it is not the less impartial because condemnatory of the common use of a purely therapeutic and poisonous

agent.

MISCELLANEOUS.

Mrs.

utterly

sweetness and light," or the porro unum will strenuously resist this prompting of the necessarium est, or the "three Lord Shaftes- evil one; and it is quite as likely that the reacburys," till his readers began to rebel against tion against his natural bent may carry him his insistency, Mrs. Ward often leans too too far in the other direction. Mrs. Humheavily on her etching-needle, and brings out phrey Ward seems to have heard of "realism," lines somewhat too deeply drawn. But it is and to have conceived the utterly false notion not so in her picture of Elise Delaunay. The that it is another word for the common-place. picture is to us a very repulsive one when one The result is that she fills her canvas with comes to consider it as a whole, and is no figures who are ordinary of the ordinary, and doubt intended so to be. But it is a marvel of that she delights in heaping up details about art,-light, airy, delicate, yet real, showing these persons and their past lives which have how fine a gauze may be manufactured out of not the smallest bearing on the story, or the purely worldly material, as well as how worth- faintest possible interest in themselves. less that material really is. Ward ought to be aware that instead of this being realism it is the very negation of realism. The aim of the realistic method is that the and see as much as possible with their eyes. reader should pass through the scenes which the chief characters in the novel pass through, How can he do this if the author is perpetually buttonholing him, and, like some housewife, insisting upon narrating the uninteresting history of a cook or a housemaid? THE PORT OF VALPARAISO.-The following statistics will furnish an idea of the importance of Valparaiso as a seaport, and also of the loss of trade sustained by the port during the civil war: In 1891 there landed 14,633 passengers, against 21,044 in 1890, or a decrease of 6,411 as compared with 1890. The number of passengers who left in 1891 was 12,929, or a falling off, as compared with 1890, of 3,868. The arrivals in 1891 exceeded the departures by 1,704. The shipping returns give the following figures: Arrivals in 1891, 1,050 vessels of 944,499 tons, as compared with 1,267 vessels of 1,204,145 tons in 1890. The departures in 1891 were 1,022 vessels of 940,955 tons, as compared with 1,270 vessels of 1,203,077 tons in 1890. These returns afford a pretty true indication of the importance of Valparaiso as a seaport, and it will hardly be credited abroad that a port which is frequented by 35,000 passengers and 2,000,000 tons of shipping a year possesses only one passenger pier, and that scarcely worthy of a fishing village. Is there nobody here capable of submitting to the Government a plan for a floating pier, or a pier of some kind, from which passengers could step into or out of a boat or a tender without running the risk of breaking their limbs or losing their lives? There is hardly a port on the coast of any importance which cannot boast of better landing accommodations than Valparaiso. Landing at Madras in a catamaran is preferable to the risk of landing at Valparaiso pier. - Chilian Times (Valparaiso), Jan. 6.

MRS. HUMPHREY WARD'S NEW BOOK. London Spectator, Feb. 20.-This constitutes a story of very high imaginative power, though it appears to us that the least satisfactory part of it is the study of the hero himself. Though the power of this story shows on the whole a great advance on that of "Robert Elsmere," and though David Grieve is more of a real person to us than Robert Elsmere, there is still something wanting from beginning to end in the individual stamp and visibility of the character. More than in the case of any other character in the book, we have to reckon together all the items we are told of him, in order to make him out, and then do not succeed in recognizing the man. But if David Grieve himself is unsatisfactory, Mrs. Humphrey Ward touches the highest point she has yet reached as an imaginative writer, in the wonderful portraits of his sister and Elise Delaunay. In " Robert Elsmere her greatLondon Saturday Review, Jan. 30. est achievement was the picture of a perfectly book is called the history of one man. good woman. There is nothing in this book to compare in moral charm with her portrait of in full, lies the weakness which we have sugCatherine. But for almost antique grandeur gested. We expect, in every biography, that RAILWAY CAPITALIZATION.-Very wonderful' of effect she has never before come near her the central figure shall be always present; in has been the increase in the capitalization of study of Louie, impossible as it is for anyone every chapter, in every page, the skillful bio- single railway companies within a few years. with ordinary experience to verify the truth of grapher never suffers the mind of the reader to It is not so very long since $50,000,000 was consuch a picture from his own observation. be for one moment diverted from the consider-sidered an extraordinary amount to be repreWhether so perfectly selfish a being ever ex.ation of the central figure. In this book David sented in a railway property, and when a few isted, we do not know. But we do know that begins as a boy and ends as a man of thirty or Mrs. Ward persuades us that, if such a being never did exist, there is an unoccupied niche in the world of reality which may yet be occupied with a statuesque selfishness like hers. The figure of Elise Delaunay is as far beyond the power of the present writer, at least, to verify, as the figure of Louie. But though not so grandiose, it is fully as original. Such inordinate desire for fame as an artist as Elise Delaunay feels, is perhaps more intelligible in a

This
Here,

so; he goes through a great quantity of ad-
ventures, and is presented in various stages of
development; but all through, from beginning
to end, he has continually to stand aside while
somebody else's story is told. The consequence
awakened at the outset are always suffered to
is that the interest and curiosity which are
decay, and even die out, instead of being kept
alive and fanned. From the artistic point of
view this is, of course, a very grave fault. If,

years ago one of the greatest companies consolidated its indebtedness into a bond issue of $160,000,000, all the world wondered. But now one plan for reorganizing the Richmond & West Point Terminal contemplates an issue of $500,000,000 in securities of the new com pany, and the deal of the coal companies with a combined capitalization of $600,000,cco is a matter of current talk. This tendency, however, is not confined to railway companies, but

characterizes all financial interests. This is

woman to the present generation than it would however, the work is to be considered as a merely the day of large things.-Railway Age

have been to any previous generation, for more women are now beginning to drink deep of that very bewildering though very unsustaining draught. But this inordinate desire for fame alone would not be impressive. It is the

collection of admirable studies rather than the

story of a single soul, this fault disappears.

The reader will find thoughts that stimulate and passages which burn; and, amid a good deal that is dull and a good deal that

these things.

(Chicago), Feb. 26.

CERTAIN INCONSISTENCIES IN NEW YORK.New York raised $15,000, of which $5,000 Last year the Grant Monument Committee in

manner in which it is intertwined with femi- is superfluous, he will find a fearless grappling went to the Secretary for salary and several nine tenderness, with playful humor, with a gen-woman, high-minded and sincere, can treat intended to raise a million dollars from the with the things that are, treated as only a hundreds more for expenses. It was originally uine though shallow passion, with knowledge of the world, with everything attractive except people of New York. In all the years since moral purity and religious feeling, of which Grant's death there has been raised $160,000. she does not show a trace, that makes the picThe modified plan calls for $340,000 more and ture so extraordinarily vivid. Mrs. Humphrey it is suggested the Legislature appropriate Ward's fault as an artist is a tendency to too half of this. New York is a queer town. It heavy a hand. Like her uncle, Matthew will pay $15,000 to see a boxing match and Arnold, who in his prose works always leaned $12,000 to see a cake-walk.-Indianapolis Sentoo heavily on his leading idea, pressing the tinel.

London Athenæum, Jan. 30.-No person of any sobriety of judgment could attribute the popularity of her former book solely to its literary merits. The temptation, therefore, to the reviewer is great to try to redress the balance by disparaging her latest production. But then if he is still an honest reviewer he

Harvest-Tide on the Volga. Isabel F. Hapgood. Atlantic, March, 14 pp.
Descriptive.

Horse-World of London. The Post-Office Horse, The Vestry Horse, and the
Brewer's Horse. W. J. Gordon. Leisure Hour, London, Feb., 6 PP, Illus.
Indians of North America. I. William E. Dougherty. Overland, March, 13 pp.
Illus. Treats of their origin. characteristics, etc.
Jamaica, The Highlands of. Lady Blake.
refers to the healthfulness of this country.
London of George the Second. Walter Besant. Harper's, March, 15 pp. Illus.
Descriptive.

N. A. Rev., March, 10 pp. Specially

Musquash, Talking. Julian Ralph. Harper's, March, 19 pp. Illus. Descriptiye of the Hudson-Bay country, and the fur-trading industry of the Northwest. Nicaragua Canal (The). Horace Davis. Overland, March, 7 pp. A forecast of its effects upon the Pacific Coast. Opal Superstition (The). bad luck.