25 FEBRUARY 1922, Page 24

Denmark : A Co-operative Commonwealth. By Frederic C. Howe. (G.

Allen & TJnwin. 7s. 6d. net.)—Dr. Howe gives masses of selected facts and figures to show how the Danish peasant has benefited by _co-operation and by technical educa- tion. Whether Danish experience will be helpful to the American farmer, as he suggests, may be doubted, for the conditions in Denmark and in the United States are wholly dissimilar. He thinks that Denmark has succeeded through the virtual disappearance of the tenant-farmer, while "tenancy is one explanation of the rapid deterioration of the American farm." He goes so far as to say that, even in England, tenant farming "results in deterioration of the soil, an impoverished people and a decaying political and social system." This is demonstrably incorrect. The success or failure of tenant-farming depends upon the varying circumstances of each case. Dr. Howe's suggestion that "the American farmer should enter politics" as the farmer has done in Denmark, and his com- mendation of the "Non-Partisan League" in North Dakota show that the book is in fact part of the agrarian propaganda that is increasing in America.