The Last American Frontier. By F. L. Paxson. (Macmillan and
Co. 6s. 6d. net.)—Every man has his own gifts, and it is perhaps unreasonable to complain that Professor Paxson does not give us much of the atmosphere with which Parkman has made us familiar He tells us how the frontier trains were made up, their size, how they were drawn, how long their journey lasted; he is, in fact, always strictly sober and historical, but the past is as dead to him as a past can be. The last few decades, those which have seen the final settlement of the Indian question, make reading that is not very interesting, and is sometimes distinctly unpleasing. It is true that the civilisation of the red man has been a difficulty with the best-intentioned races, and if his conquest is not to be reckoned among the.triumphs of the United States rule, we must not emphasise the fact too much. One thing must be said. The romance of the last American frontier is bound up with the Santa Fe and Oregon trails, and these chapters are certainly the most interesting in the book ; but in view of their importance and celebrity we may wonder that the only illustration of them is the merest sketch with only a few names marked upon it. Some other illustrations of little value might well have made way for plans or maps which would have helped us to understand the historical sketch of these old routes of the trader and the adventurer. It should be said, however, that the story is essentially trustworthy and impartial, and that the bibliography appended is all that could be wished.
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