But in steering clear of unremunerative production, it is easy to fall upon the rock of profitable beneficence. Does Alderman Thompson's scheme deserve to be ranked with that kind of philanthropy which, as a leading counsel once suggested, yields a much larger income than, say, the ownership of a newspaper? It would seem not; for while he insists on the absence of loss through bad debts or injuries to property, he points out in several places how advantageously the interest might be relinquished for the benefit of tenants, converted into old-age pensions, or applied to the provision of dwellings for a poorer class (p. 31). It is plain that he is not touting a safe investment, but simply showing the merits of intelligent provision for a class which at present fares little better than the lowest. The demolition of existing dwellings, even in slums, is earnestly deprecated until better ones, and enough of better ones, have been built to replace them. The principle hitherto acted on in regard to large town improvements appears to be "If you drive people out from a bad place, they will somehow find a better "-whereas in practice they have somehow found a worse.

To the ordinary reader, the rents mentioned in English Country Cottages appear inconceivably low-1s. or 9d. a week for a house and garden,-while good houses in a favoured district often fetch less than bad houses in a crowded one. The rents for municipal cottages, on the other hand, appear very high: 1s. per room (and 6d. for a scullery) is asked in Liverpool from tenants of a class distinctly below the artisan; and 1s. 6d. a room is the rate at which the Birmingham Milk Street flats are to be let, though in this case only the actual livingrooms are counted. In Richmond, rents are even higher-7s. 6d. for a good independent seven-roomed cottage with bow windows, 6s. for a plain but excellent house (lacking, however, the desirable third bedroom), and 4s. 6d. for a tenement of two rooms and a scullery. The explanation of these contrasting figures lies in a pithy sentence by Alderman Thompson: "Broadly speaking, the housing difficulty in large towns is essentially a Land question, and in Rural Districts a Wages question."

Questions of so wide a scope are apt, of course, to hang over a country for centuries waiting for solution; and the nations which attempt an instant grapple with them may suffer severely in the endeavour. The English and their kin are slow at the task: they have never yet set to work to find a radical cure either for the agricultural dislocation caused by the Black Death, or for the congestion of great cities which James I. attempted to reform; but when a definite little job is set before them with its scheme of definite costs,

they sometimes undertake it, and then do it well. The task at present urgent is the provision of cheap but adequate house-room for the working, as distinct from the loafing, classes. In rural England, Mr. Green's book shows that this has yet to be begun; for the examples he cites of cottage construction by the Dukes of Westminster and Bedford, the Earl of Coventry and Lord Wantage, can only be regarded as ideals set before the future builder. In the large towns it is already afoot; and one point especially admirable in Alderman Thompson's memorandum is that he shows how flats or model " lodging-houses for the uncertain worker may be safely provided when the regular workers are already properly housed. In Leith, Glasgow, and Huddersfield (p. 18) these difficult undertakings are being managed with success; they provide, no doubt, for the "regular" workers when single, as for the intermittent labourer when in work; but for the "broken down with precarious earnings," the author emphatically says that "no Homes under present conditions can be provided, except as a means of charitable or outdoor relief" (p. 3).

Even for workmen's dwellings of the paying class, he calls for a standard rental fixed by Government, and a remission of rates; while the salvation of the country labourer, according to Mr. Green, is to be found in gardens and allotments-the Land question thus turning to money regulations for aid, and the Wages question to the Land. The measures proposed are no heroic remedies, and for this reason they accord all the better with the consciousness of the age-a consciousness which realizes that its best work is the scrappy, patient cell-accumulation of the coral insect, making ready for another generation to overcrest the waves.

One question troubles the reader turning over the designs, elevations, and views of streets or pairs of cottages-must they all be so inevitably ugly? Cheerful they are, and very likely pretty and inviting within; but the outside invariably has, to put it mildly, no beauty. "There was to be no architectural adornment," says Mr. Boulnois, if the houses built at Liverpool were to pay. "Expensive ornamentation should be discouraged," says Alderman Thompson, with more than a side-glance at the London County Council's constructions. "Cottages might be erected to pay their way," Mr. Green thinks; and after enumerating the conditions in which they might possibly pay, he gives views of such cottages (pp. 155, 225, 229),—a dismal contrast to the picturesque extravagances on his early pages. Can it be that economy forbids all beauty? How was it possible for artisans to live in artistic houses five centuries ago, if now they must dispense with all adornment— facings and coigns of coloured brick being allowed, indeed, but not a

high-pitched roof? The answer seems to be that a house can only be made beautiful by or for its own occupant; houses built for strangers to inhabit have no sufficient reason for being picturesque, and fail in attractiveness when they attempt it. Is anything more irritating than the "quaint, pretty" houses put up in some neighbourhoods by speculative builders-" quaintness" which repeats itself ad nauseam, and "prettiness" which at the third time of seeing is revealed as rank affectation? It is best that artisans' dwellings should be free at least from these defects, and depend for their picturesqueness on what the care and taste of the dweller can provide-in Richmond, at all events, a covering of creepers grows easily. As things are, it is doubtful whether the working man gains by owning his house (Mem., pp. 38, 39), and therefore he has less reason for adding permanent decoration; but if in other days conditions were to arise in which he could choose and partly design the home for his family, then would come the scope and opportunity for beauty.

T. NUNNS.

PROBLEMS OF MODERN INDUSTRY. BY SIDNEY and BEATRICE WEBB. [286 pp. 8vo. 7s. 6d. Longmans. London, 1898.]

This volume contains eleven articles and addresses, written at various dates ranging from 1888 to 1895. But though it contains nothing that has not seen the light before, and has no very great importance for those who are already familiar with the study of social problems, yet it ought to be very useful in creating an interest in the questions of which it treats. This, indeed, is a purpose for which it is admirably suited, as it is brightly written for the most part, and principles are dealt with as well as problems.

The subjects treated include Women's Wages, the Sweating System, Poor Law Reform, the Regulation of the Hours of Labour, and the Relation of Trade-Unionism to the Co-operative Movement. The two final essays are an excellent and lucid statement of the grounds for an intelligent kind of Industrial Socialism. The chapter on "Women's Wages" contains a great deal of exceedingly valuable information, which is perhaps all the more valuable in that the facts are treated with the utmost impartiality, and are not used in support of the "Policy of a National Minimum," since elaborated in Industrial Democracy.

The article on "The Reform of the Poor Law" advocates the "depauperization" of our paupers, and treats in detail of some topics of poor-law reform. Every reformer will agree with the plea for

efficient education of the children, and with the general drift of what Mr. Webb says on hospital reform. But the main thesis of the article scarcely exhibits the caution which usually characterizes Mr. Webb's writings. No one has done more than he to show that Socialism cannot mean making every one equally comfortable all round, and the inconsistency of Trade Sectionalism with true Socialism is vigorously pointed out in this volume. But surely the "depauperization of our paupers " is a "sectional" policy. The fact is, that the reforms advocated in this article are really only justifiable on a frankly communistic basis, and to advocate out-relief and old-age pensions, as Mr. Webb does here, as long as society is organized on a mainly individualistic basis, is dangerous to social progress. Ought not old-age pensions rather to be the last measure of the Socialistic Utopia? If the proletariate were to get its panem et circenses in the near future, we might say good-bye to social progress for a long time.

Mrs. Webb reprints her article on the East End Jews from Life and Labour of the People: if it were written at the present day, something would have to be said on the relation of the Jews to the housing problem. And the volume is opened by her vivid and delightful “Diary of an Investigator: would that her courage and enthusiasm had more imitators, and many of the "problems of modern industry" would be on a fair way to solution!

W. C. ROBERTS. LA PRÉVOYANCE SOCIALE EN ITALIE. Par LEOPOLD MABILLEAU, CHARLES ROYNERI, et le COMTE DE ROCQUIgny. [378 pp. Crown 8vo. 4 francs. Colin. Paris, 1898.] Although considerable attention has been directed to the social conditions of Italy, the causes of her economic grievances have not yet been fully apprehended. The riots in North Italy, in the early part of May, 1898, have shown that the country is still full of discontent, which may take a dangerous form whenever an opportunity recurs. Though the causes of that disturbance were probably as much political as economic, yet it is generally acknowledged that the condition of the Italian poorer classes is so unsatisfactory that such occurrences are to be expected unless remedies are found.

That this book is an attempt to suggest certain remedies is, perhaps, its chief merit. Any conscientious effort for such an object is worthy of praise, apart from any consideration of the practical nature of the schemes proposed; for it is only by constant attention to details, such as is here shown, that the true cause and its remedy can be discovered.

The introduction begins with a timely reminder that no judgment on economic facts in Italy is valid, unless it takes into consideration the unfavourable conditions out of which has sprung the youthful kingdom. One of the chief of these is obviously the heavy taxation. Again, till 1880, the agriculturist has suffered from the great difficulty in getting money advanced on loan; the only two ways open to him being usury and mortgage, both systems being very corrupt.

Indeed, concerning the latter, the words of the deputy Borsarelli are more expressive than any comment :-" L'Italie n'est plus q'une expression géographique, mais nous n'y gagnons plus grand' chose: c'est maintenant une expression hypothécaire." Emigration, the only refuge in an agricultural country where agriculture does not pay, has attained such a proportion, that attention has at last been roused, and an impulse has been given to efforts for an economic regeneration which shall equal or surpass the political regeneration of this century. The authors find reason for the hope that Italy is advancing in the path of social organization. In 1895 a "mission" was sent by the "Musée Social" to the "Congrès des Banques Populaires" in Bologna, and we have here in detail the results of that and similar investigations. A certain originality is claimed for the Italian method, for it is marked by a union which governs and centralises all separate efforts. In one word, the secret of Italy's economic, as of her political revival, is to be found in union. Necessity has forced a recognition of co-operation as an indispensable remedy for her grievances.

The three sub-divisions of this book are each concerned with some application of this principle-Co-operation in Banks and the Credit System, in Agriculture, and among Workmen. The part dealing with the credit system is particularly instructive. It is a recognized fact that small industries are greatly hampered by the lack of capital. A wise loan is sometimes the beginning of a fortunate career. But where the risk would discourage an individual lender, it is scarcely felt by a society which can be both a savings bank and a bank of credit to its members.

LE

W. M. MAMMATT.

SOCIALISME ET LA RÉVOLUTION FRANÇAISE. Étude sur les Idées Socialistes en France de 1789 à 1796. Par ANDRÉ LICHTENBERGER, Docteur-en-Lettres.

5 fs. Alcan. Paris, 1899.]

[316 pp. 8vo.

I am sorry not to be acquainted with M. Lichtenberger's previous work, Le Socialisme au XVIII Siècle, which apparently leads up to the present one, the unmistakable value of the one supplying a