MUNICIPAL GOVERNMENT IN EUROPE.* THIS work is a sequel to,
or rather an extension of, the author's well-known book on Municipal Government in Great Britain. Like its predecessor, it is characterised by great thoroughness, and a really intimate personal knowledge of the cities and towns whose government the author describes and criticises. Dr. Albert Shaw is an American whose name English newspaper-readers may have seen lately appended to cablegrams dealing with the Venezuelan imbroglio. The most casual reader of his pages could not be in any doubt as to the author's nationality for a moment. Every chapter, nay, every page, teems with evidences of that "New World inquisitiveness" which is such a marked characteristic of Americans and of our own Colonial English. Probably it arises from the fact that they and their own institutions are in the early experimental stage,—a condition very favourable either
to progress or instability. When Dr. Wordsworth, the present Bishop of Salisbury, was travelling lately through New Zealand—a Colonial community essentially
British in many respects — he was struck by this peculiarity of the people. Whenever he met a colonist he was subjected to a process of cross-examination as to his country, his Church, and his family history, fol- lowed up by a series of queries as to how New Zealand and its institutions struck him. Conventional English people are quite embarrassed by this inquisitiveness, and resent it as ill-mannered, which is one of the reasons of the unpopu- larity of our "globe-trotters," who are there thought stiff and stuck-up.
Canova is said to have declared, referring to the fashion- able neglect of Flaxman in his day, that the English were a people who learned "through their ears and not through their eyes." This is certainly not true of the American and Colonial English, who prefer to get their information first- hand rather than from books. This "New World inquisitive. ness " has had everything to do with the writing of Dr.
Shaw's work. Not that the author has not read, and read thoroughly, many profound treatises on his own and cognate subjects, but in the main he has gone to the actual facts and looked at them from his own personal standpoint.
The book is one that should be attentively read and con- sidered by not only every member of our County Councils, but by every intelligent burgess who professes to have an opinion on municipal government. The English reader will find much to astonish him in these pages, much also that should enlighten and instruct. The day has gone by when the typical John Bull (who was always rather a creation of fiction than of fact) held that foreigners and inferiors were synonymous terms, and who strictly believed that no country in Europe could teach the true-born Englishman a useful lesson, save perhaps in such trivial matters as singing, dancing, and cookery. If such a prejudiced person still exists in these islands, the inhabitants of which are, after all, the greatest travellers on earth, then we recommend the instant and care- ful perusal of Dr. Shaw's chapters on Paris and the German cities.
Dr. Shaw deals with Paris as the "typical modern city."
This of itself is suggestive. Paris, we know, appeals to the pleasure-seeking American tourist on account of its bright- ness and gaiety ; but it would appear that it is also the City of Light for the Transatlantic sociologist. This, after all, is but natural, as Paris made such a clean sweep of its ancient institutions at the Revolution that it may fairly claim in all essentials to be as "modern" as New York, if not Chicago. This great break with the past has doubtless its good side ; but Dr. Shaw sees only that side. We should like to quote a very striking and characteristic passage bearing on this :—
" At the close of the French Revolution and for some decades thereafter there was in Europe no sentiment for old architec- tural monuments, and especially none for mediseval churches. This sentiment now pervades all Europe ; and the most affectionate preservation, with cautious, faithful restorations, is the order everywhere. Such a spirit was lacking in the genera- • Municipal Government in Continental Europe. By Albert Shaw. London . Fisher Unwin. tions immediately preceding our own, and nowhere was its advance more complete than in the French capital. The religious orders had built their great monastic houses, and their splendid churches everywhere in Paris the new street system plowed (sic) through their churches as relentlessly as through shabby tenement rows. Scores of examples of the most beautiful ecclesiastical structures of the Middle Ages were obliterated to make room for broad, straight avenues, open squares, and new regular buildings. Nowadays such sacrilege would not be tolerated. It is fortunate, therefore, for the Parisians that their central street reforms were chiefly accom- plished before the rise of the new appreciation of church. architecture But it was for Paris to sacrifice every- thing to the modern ideas of symmetry, spaciousness, and regularity, and to build the great Opera House as a central feature, and as a suggestive symbol of the new spirit."
We would not mind leaving the matter to the vote of Dr. Shaw's intelligent countrymen whether London is not better as it is with Westminster Abbey standing, than if that exquisite medimval pile were pulled down, and as a recompense all our streets were suddenly made broad and straight, with the most gorgeous of brand-new opera-houses as the central point and glory of the new city.
Differing thus in toto from our American social philosopher
as to some of his methods of renovating old historic cities,. we yet uphold him to the full in his contention that our cities must be in some way modernised. As he points out, civilised men and women crowd more and more into the towns. This is not only tree of England and Europe, but also of America and Australia. And the great problem facing our rulers is this : How are we to preserve the health and vitality of a people which is increasingly city-born and city-bred ?
We talk glibly of London and Paris, Rome, Vienna, and Berlin, as " old " cities, when, as Dr. Shaw shows, they are largely as new as, or newer than, New York, Philadelphia, or Boston. The nomenclature of our very streets is enough to show this. In the heart of the city of London, and of the city of Westminster, we find Victoria Street and Queen Victoria Street ; while the two main thoroughfares of Sydney are George and Pitt Streets! The bulk of the London suburbs are newer and infinitely larger than anything in San Francisco or Melbourne. In a word, New London has almost obliterated Old London.
It is evident that these vast and ever-growing urban com- munities need a form of municipal government which shall ensure the best sanitary conditions, wide thoroughfares, open spaces, and all that can be done to give the people as much light and pure air as possible. Dr. Shaw holds that while Paris led the way, and is therefore the "typical modern city," we must look to the German cities if we English and Americans would learn the best that has been achieved in municipal government and social reform.
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