THE PHILANTHROPIC WORK OF JOSEPHINE SHAW LOWELL.
Phi/anthropic Work of Josephine Shaw Lowdl. By William Rhinelander Stewart. (Macmillan and Co. 88.6d. net.)—Josephine Shaw was in her twenty-first year when she married Charles Russell Lowell, a nephew of the famous man of letters. He was killed something less than a year later in making a reconnaissance in the Virginian campaign of the autumn of 1664. Here we have the story of what she did during the forty years of her widowhood —she died in October 1905. "Had she lived in mediteval times," writes one who knew something of her work, "she would long since have been canonized as a saint." All her efforts wore carefully reasoned. She was not a tender-hearted Lady Bountiful, though all agree in describing her as eminently womanly I she worked on logical principles and with an unfailing perseverance and courage, as, indeed, charity is bound to work nowadays if it is to achieve real results. Many of her activities are reckoned as "Services to the State." Civil Service Reform was one of them. She promoted College Settlements, she founded and for nearly thirty years pre- sided over a Charity Organization Society. She was energetic in promoting the Consumers' League—a powerful means of combat- ing the sweating practices so common in trade. Other spheres of work were the dealing with unemployment, arbitrations between capital and labour, reformatories, the prevention of vagrancy. In short her band was everywhere, and she was as prudent as she was enthusiastic, as full of common sense as sho was of zeal. Workers may find in this volume, which is largely occupied with her letters and speeches, not only a striking picture of devotion, but much practical instruction.
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