Figures for or against the persistence of peasantry are conflicting; but at any rate great numbers of peasants remain. . . . Reformists have substituted a policy of actively assisting the peasants for the orthodox policy of leaving them to succumb to capitalism.*

.....

As Mr. Ensor goes on to say, the policy of championing the peasant has important supporters in France and Germany, though not the acknowledged party policy in either. Socialists like Kautsky are favorable to the protection of the peasant, though they do not all go as far as Dr. Edouard David, the Revisionist leader who strongly supports peasant proprietorship.

Agrarian Socialism quite openly admits and confirms private ownership of capital. Reformist Socialism generally admits and confirms private capitalism, practically if not professedly, by the policy it pursues with regard to social reforms. This point has been brought out most forcibly by Mr. Hilaire Belloc in The Servile State. The chief argument of that book is this: that you cannot possibly establish Socialism except by confiscating the property of the capitalists. It is a mere confusion of thought to suppose Socialism can be brought about if you give the capitalists compensation. Now there has not been any confiscation of capital effected. Socialist parties are not even demanding confiscation, they are giving and offering compensation; and accordingly they are not advancing one step towards Socialism. Socialism involves a transfer of the means of production from private owners to the State. If the State, in taking over any particular undertaking, gives the owners less than the full value, then there is confiscation. If the State does give the full value, then the private owners lose none of their capital, and the State gains none. So there is no transfer of property from capitalist to State! Hypothetically the State might give full compensation, and still gain capital if by more economical working or some other cause the capital which it acquired subsequently rose in value above its purchase price. Conversely, the State would lose if the capital subsequently fell below its purchase price in value. In either case the wholesale change required by Socialism is hardly to be expected from such fluctuations.

Socialization by compensation is more than impracticable; it is inconceivable. Socialism by confiscation is at least conceivable, but the difficulties against it in practice are so great that Socialist pol

*Modern Socialism, by R. C. K. Ensor.

iticians do not dare to propose it. Accordingly the Socialists are contenting themselves with a policy for merely regulating capitalism. They will establish labor exchanges to adjust the supply of labor to the demand for it, and thus regularize employment; they will establish wage boards and courts of arbitration to settle the lowest wages which an employer will be permitted to give, and the terms at which the worker will be compelled to work; they will establish a great many more compulsory things, like State insurance, all for regulating the relation between capitalistic employer and proletarian wage-earner, but still they will leave the one a capitalist and the other proletarian. All this is beautifully evident in England, where the Socialist Labor Party works so harmoniously with the Liberal Party. Perhaps the solution is the best possible one; but it is not the solution that Socialist theory demanded until a short time ago. And as I have already indicated, the rise of Syndicalism seems to show that the solution is not giving universal satisfaction.

In this article we have seen something of the obscureness of Socialist theory, of the despairing compromises of Socialist policy, and of the Syndicalist revolt against both theory and policy. However we regard contemporary Socialism, it is plainly in a process of disintegration. A Socialist deputy in the French Chamber recently designated his party "un parti sans doctrine," and bitterly criticized the contradictions between its principles and its actions. He attributed the defect to a neglect of theoretical studies by French Socialists. An able critic, M. Lemozin, writing in the Mouvement Social of January, 1912, offered a different explanation. He asked: "Is not Socialism finding itself opposed by experience, by life itself, which rejects it as an inassimilable element?" The same writer concludes:

Socialism is now hardly more than an electioneering springboard; as a body of principles it is in course of dissolution not only in France, but in all countries; its dogmas die one after the other; it will survive only by constant adaptations and transformations in unceasing "revisions," and this revisionism will be its disintegration. For the mass of the workers it is neither a doctrine nor a Utopia of the future; it is merely a collection of immediate demands. As sociology, it has but superficial roots in the popular mind. Syndicalism is gaining to Socialism's loss.

SAINTS ROUND THE ALTAR.

BY EMILY HICKEY.

On, they throng, the countless Hallows, round the altar where He lies, Whom we see by Faith's high vision, Whom they see with open eyes.

These, the glorious Saints of Jesus, women and men who held on high Fast the standard of the Lamb through all their sharpest agony.

These, the lovely Saints of Jesus, women and men whose lives confest Through the good of God's bestowing the perfection of His best.

These, the darling baby Hallows, crowned with golden crowns that

press

No whit heavier than the daisy wreaths of childly happiness.

Oh, the whiteness of their raiment, raiment washed in priceless Blood! Oh, the brightness of their faces, blest in Love's beatitude!

Saints of Jesus, Saints of Jesus, who your blest reward have won, At His altar we are kneeling, in your sweet communion.

We the erring, we the feeble, we by storm-winds tossed and driven, We the conquered in the battles where so faintly we had striven.

We with sordid spirit meanly who look down and thus deny
To our eyes the unuttered grandeur of God's generosity.

We who grovel, seeking, searching-we, the children of the KingSoiled possessions, worthless havings, with a muck-rake gathering.

Pray for us, O happy Hallows, ye who bring to this high place
Honour folded in His honour, grace reflexion of His grace.

Pray for us all weak and needing, yet who say in faith serene, This your Monarch is our Brother, and our Mother is your Queen!

THE OBERAMMERGAU OF CALIFORNIA.

BY C. STUART MADDEN.

HE true pageant play, the object of which is to portray the early history of a people or community in an inspiring light, has been eagerly sought after in America, but found very difficult of attainment, in that the tableaux that constituted it, however splendid, appealed only to the imagination of the spectators, and failed to reach their hearts. A further difficulty has been due to the fact that, generally speaking, our nation lacks a past and romantic ruins for a background; that her beginnings are comparatively new; that we have not sufficient perspective as yet to permit of a haze of romance and historic poetry; that we have no ancient heritage.

But there is one chapter in American history, well suited for such a purpose, that has hitherto been overlooked, namely, the old mission days of California. Everyone knows in a general way of the California Missions, and has admired their picturesque structure; but their vast importance in the history of California is not yet fully appreciated. Our present California is the superstructure built upon the work of these missions as a foundation. The impression prevails with some that, because the mission buildings have fallen to decay, the work itself was a failure; but it must be remembered that the buildings and the material wealth possessed were but the exterior evidences of an interior spiritual work. The buildings have decayed, but the real work and object of the mission Fathers the planting of religion and of true wisdom-remain, for neither earthquakes, conflagrations, nor commercialism can obliterate them.

The Franciscan Friars, who joyfully undertook the great and glorious, though highly dangerous, task of Christianizing and thus civilizing California, led a life rigorous in the extreme, quite devoid of carnal desire for self-indulgence or gain of any sort for themselves. They had very few comforts, and their privations were ofttimes tragic. Yet the stage on which their lives were set supplies such a wealth of color, action, and grandeur, that it yields rich and ample material for a spectacular, historic drama, such as is now wrought into the first American production of this character ever successfully offered to the public-" The Mission Play."

To John Steven McGroarty, already prominent in literary circles in California as one of its foremost historians, as well as a talented poet, belongs the honor of this brilliant triumph. So great an achievement could only be possible to a soul deeply imbued with sympathy for the work and longings of these devout men of indomitable purpose, and restless, unquenchable zeal. Mr. McGroarty has, with consummate art, depicted the various types of human beings that were a feature in the lives of these loved and loving Fathers, of their many responsibilities, emergencies, and difficulties, as well as the various innocent pastimes upon which they benignly smiled. The incidents of the play are entirely true to historical facts.

This project was accompanied by the appropriate idea of building for the play a theatre on mission soil, in the immediate vicinity of San Gabriel Mission, which was founded in 1771 under the direction of, and visited very many times by, the saintly Father Junipero Serra. Though now scarred and worn, it has escaped destruction. The ground on which the playhouse stands is historic, having been donated by the parish for the purpose. On this spot the Indian neophytes, under the direction of the padres, made the stone and brick with which they built San Gabriel Mission. Two gigantic pepper trees, planted by Father Junipero himself during the last years of his life, grace the entrance to the theatre grounds. Most of the stage properties, and many of the costumes, are historical relics, loaned by enthusiastic Californians. Every performer in the cast of three hundred is a native of California, and so great is their pride in the play that many are serving without pay. Thus we have here a combination of perfect conditions for a truly great pageant play-historic ground and appointments, also community enthusiasm.

The decoration of the theatre has been most appropriately and attractively arranged by Mr. Henry Kabierske, a well-known director of pageants. Like the missions of old, it is surrounded by a stockade, leaving a broad promenade all around the theatre building. The promenade is a miniature of El Camino Real " The King's Highway" of the old days—inasmuch as along it are built tiny facsimiles of the entire twenty-one missions, the spaces between which represent the rough mountainous country. The little missions are true reproductions, about two feet high, having tiled roofs, plastered walls, and are complete with patios, arches, towers, belfries, and bells, even to lights in the windows. An excellent idea is thus formed of the comparative style and extent of the