with the receipts and expenses justly attributable to the particular year is examined; the English use of the former method is contrasted. with the adoption of the latter by the French, and the Italian system is shown to be an intermediate one (pp. 57-58). In describing the discussion of the budget under the English system, Signor Masè-Dari, while he very clearly contrasts the English method of direct examination with the Continental system of appointing a special commission, yet seems to approach, if not to adopt, the common error that by some kind of convention or use of influence the committees of "supply" and "ways and means are practically limited to a small number of competent members. Amongst the three advantages that he attributes to this method (p. 112), the most important one is omitted-viz., the fixing of responsibility for the estimates on the Government, instead of on private members, and thereby securing consistency in the proposals made.

In general, it must be said that the explanations of English legislative and administrative procedure are clear and impartial.

Such questions as "the right of the Chambers to reject the budget," "the relation in financial legislation of the two Chambers," and "the budget as law" complete the work as a study of an important branch of finance, and one passed over too lightly by most English economists. C. F. BASTABLE

Our Treatment of the Poor. By W. CHANCE, M.A. (London: P. S. King and Son. Pp. 233.)

MR. CHANCE is well known as an authority on the Poor Law whose knowledge is gained from practical experience as an administrator. To some extent the volume before us covers the same ground as his two previous books; but it seems better adapted than they to meet the needs of the general public. The chapter on Old Age Pensions will be found especially useful by those who feel themselves bewildered among the numerous schemes which have been propounded by latter-day philanthropists; it is a thorough and interesting account of the recent history of the movement so far as it has been before the public. Its political history still remains to be written, but any student desirous of selecting a scheme to reject or support cannot do better than consult Mr. Chance's account.

The transition from Old Age Pensions to Friendly Societies is more natural in a book than in reality, and the relation of both to the Poor Law is well worth studying in detail. In the chapter called "The English Poor Law and Friendly Societies," Mr. Chance emphasises a passage of history which is too little known, and which should be repeated by every teacher of philanthropists until his pupils show themselves able to draw the right conclusions from it. The remaining chapters on "A Model Union," "Public and Private Charity," and "In Defence of Poor Law Schools," are all characterised by the firmness

with which the author takes his stand upon facts, and the steady clearness with which from that basis he maintains his principles. One obiter dictum had perhaps been better omitted-i.e. the suggestion whether it might not be well to graduate the increase of a relieving officer's salary by the decrease in pauperism-an experiment which could hardly be safely tried unless with very exceptional men.

HELEN BOSANQUET

The Economic Writings of Sir William Petty, together with the Observations upon the Bills of Mortality, more probably by Captain John Graunt. Edited by CHARLES HENRY HULL, Ph.D., Cornell University. (Cambridge: at the University Press. 1899. 2 vols. demy 8vo, with three facsimiles. Pp. xci, 700. Price 25s.)

ONE of the many bonds between British and American economists is a common interest in the older writers who are in a special sense their common ancestors in science. Dr. Bonar and Dr. Hollander on different sides of the Atlantic are collaborating on an edition of Ricardo's letters to Trower. When Professor Dunbar was bringing out the reprint of Cantillon for Harvard University, he courteously asked a young Englishman for a prefatory note. And now Dr. Hull thanks "the Syndics of the University Press. . . for the publication of a book whose editor might have looked in vain for assistance at home." We should not have thought so; but Dr. Hull probably knows best, and in any case we could not have wished for a better edition of Petty than these handsome volumes, with their fine old-fashioned type, careful reproductions of title pages, facsimiles of manuscripts, and successful preservation of the old-world air which adds to the charm of reading a seventeenth century writer. The British Economic Association had long cherished the ambition of reprinting some of Petty's most important writings such as The Political Anatomy of Ireland, or the Treatise of Taxes and Contributions. Happily this task is now better performed by Dr. Hull's complete collection of Petty's Economic Writings, in the preparation of which he has collated the original manuscripts and different texts, as well as ransacked the byeways of literature in a true antiquarian spirit. Coming so soon after Lord Edmond Fitzmaurice's authoritative Life of Petty, this definitive edition of the works absolves students for some time from research about Petty. They have only the pleasant and profitable duty to read these books, and need waste neither time nor money in the hopeless task of collecting the original editions for themselves.

It was a happy thought of Dr. Hull to print the Natural and Political Observations of Graunt in this edition. The evidence that Graunt is entitled to the credit of writing this early essay in Statistics is overwhelming; and the editor, while deferring to the weight of testimony, exhibits his impartiality by allowing a somewhat higher

value to the arguments of the other side than some of us are disposed to do. We see for instance, no reason for arguing in favour of Petty from parallel passages in the Political Anatomy of Ireland which was published at a later date. But Petty has been so often named (by himself and others) in connection with the Observations, that it is well to gratify the curiosity of the reader by reprinting a work in the posthumous edition of which Petty had certainly a hand. Above all, Graunt's scarce work is so important in itself in the history of Statistics that we welcome its reproduction. And Dr. Hull tells us more about Graunt than we knew before, while his essay on the Bills of Mortality, his general editorial introductions and his industrious, but unobtrusive references, deserve the highest praise. HENRY HIGGS

Economic Aspects of the Liquor Problem. By JOHN KOREN. An Investigation made for the Committee of Fifty, under the direction of Henry W. Farnam, Secretary of the Economic Sub-committee. (Boston and New York: Houghton, Mifflin & Co. 1899.)

THIS is the second volume issued by the Committee of Fifty, a voluntary association formed in the United States for the purpose of carrying on independent investigation into different phases of the drink problem.

It is the record of an attempt made to ascertain statistically "what fraction of pauperism destitution and crime may be fairly attributed to liquor, and how this loss is distributed among different classes and races.' The general result of the inquiry is to show that the poverty which falls under the notice of the charity organisation and kindred societies is traceable to liquor in some 25 per cent. of all the cases, while 37 per cent. of the "institutionalised" poor owe their position to the same cause. Of destitute or neglected children 45 per cent. suffer through the intemperance of their parents. In 50 per cent. of the cases of crime examined intemperance figured as one of the

causes.

It is obvious that the relations between drink and poverty and crime cannot admit of accurate mathematical expression. However carefully the figures are sifted by skilled investigators, they are based upon opinion, and must simply stand, as Mr. Koren truly says, for an approximate expression of the truth.

No one familiar with the question will be disposed to accuse the figures of exaggeration, but the results of intemperance are far from exhausting the economic aspects of the liquor problem. Besides the drinking which produces intemperance, there is a large amount of drinking which, while falling short of intemperance, is yet largely excessive and out of all proportion to the rate of wages. The effects of such waste might well have entered into such an investigation as that here recorded.

The figures throw an interesting light on the drinking habits of the various nationalities, which are in the course of being fused together in the United States, and special chapters are devoted to the effects. of liquor on the Negroes and the Indians.

The last chapter on "Social Aspects of the Saloon" seems somewhat out of place in this volume. Its object appears to be to relieve the dark colours in which the terrible effects of intemperance have been painted, by showing, that the saloon ministers to many other social needs than mere drinking, and that the setting up of counter attractions is an important part of temperance work. Few will be found to dispute this, but if all public-houses in this country were on the same model as those in the 13th ward of Chicago, described in this chapter, temperance work would be less urgent than it is. In the saloons of that favoured locality drinking is quite a secondary business; free lunches, papers, card-tables, pool-tables, gymnasia and even a fives-court are the primary attractions. The saloon-keeper is a social leader who keeps open house; he lends money and sends clothes, fuel and food to those in need; he is a man "with a warm heart and a glad hand." The social stimulus of men is then epitomized in the saloon. It is a centre of learning, books, papers and lecture-hall to them. It is the clearing house for common intelligence, the place where their philosophy of life is worked out, and their political and social beliefs take their begin. nings, &c." After this it is sad to find that virtue is its own reward, for "profits have been reduced to a minimum, and more saloon-keepers than any other class of tradesmen fail in business."

The book is of unequal merit, but on the whole, Mr. Koren and Professor Farnam may be congratulated on their efforts to present a mass of statistical information in a readable form. SIDNEY PEEL

Centralised Administration of Liquor Laws in the American Commonwealths. By CLEMENT MOORE LACEY SITES, LL.B., Ph.D. Studies in History, Economics, and Public Law. Edited by the Faculty of Political Science of Columbia University. Vol. X., No. 3. (New York: Published for Columbia University by the Macmillan Company. London: P. S. King & Son. 1899.)

"THE crux of the liquor laws," says Mr. Sites," is the reconciling of police regulation with sumptuary and social desires. Over against the ethical principle in legislation is set the social principle in human nature; over against economic welfare is set physical appetite; over against the functions of Government are set the instincts of personal liberty, and the conflict is more acute and far-reaching than in most of the spheres of human interest which Government has entered." Accordingly, in the attempts to solve these problems, a tangled growth of legislative enactments has sprung up, dealing with systems both of regulation and of administration. In the present volume, Mr. Sites

takes one feature of the mass, viz., the tendency during recent years in the United States to remedy the imperfections of local administration by calling in the administrative control of the central executive officers of the commonwealth, and considers the relations of these developments to particular regulative plans in the light of the principles of political science. He divides administration into the different spheres of revenue, licence, police, commercial (including schemes of municipalisation or local management of the liquor traffic) and judicial. He examines the developments in the direction of centralised administration in each sphere in different states, and attempts to lay down the conditions under which such centralization is possible and desirable.

This difficult task has been performed with much knowledge as well as much skill and elaboration,-perhaps too much, for the intricacy of the subject sometimes betrays the author into some obscurity of language. Liquor legislation is still so much in the experimental stage, and so dependent for its success on its adaptation to a minute variety of shifting local conditions, that a treatise like the present is more fitted for the mental training of students than the enlightenment of practical reformers. SIDNEY PEEL

La Propriété Paysanne, étude d'Economie Rurale.

By A. SOUCHON, Professor at the Universities of Paris and Lyons. (Paris: Larose and Forcel. 1899. 1899. Pp. viii and 257.) PROFESSOR SOUCHON's book is an interesting and valuable contribution to the study of the situation of agriculture in France. But it especially investigates the state and prospects of what he calls la propriété paysanne moyenne, meaning middling agricultural freeholds. large enough to sustain their owner and his family without supplementary earnings under the form of occasional receipt of wages, and not so large as to require auxiliary paid labour. Professor Souchon thus excludes from his investigations la grande propriété, land for which rent is paid, and diminutive holdings belonging to people whose subsistence is based on the receipt of wages. The extent of these middling freeholds cultivated by their owners without any exterior assistance, he describes as varying between five and twenty hectares (say from twelve and a half to fifty acres), and after a careful sifting of existing statistics, he computes their number at about 1,000,000, giving occupation and yielding their livelihood to the same number of families composed on an average of four members. Its global value he puts at 15,000,000,000, the whole of French rural property being estimated at 70,000,000,000 of francs.

Professor Souchon is a decided abettor of this kind of tenure and cultivation. Still, he does not go to the extremity of proscribing altogether other existing systems; he even considers that owing to their educational influence the speedy disappearance of large estates is not desirable. Quite diminutive freeholds he, on the contrary,