THE QUARTERLIES.
Tire New Parliament and the House of Lords," the last article in the Edinburgh, discusses in a temperate way the present political crisis. The Edinburgh strongly advised the House of Lords not to reject the Budget, and it is justified is pointing out that the action of the House, whether intrinsically right or wrong, has not had a good result. At the same time, it denounces the single-Chamber policy of the Ministry, while showing that the Second Chamber as at present constituted has very grave defects. Of late years it has been recruited in very dubious ways. The principle of reform has, however, been accepted with something not far removed from unanimity ; with this starting-point it cannot be difficult to reach a 'satisfactory result. " What a Second Chamber should: do ler'us is to, giye us time." Surely that should not be beyond our power to arrange. It would be something if it were provided that a measure sent up by two successive Houses of Commons should be submitted to the Crown.—The article on "The English Peasant " is worth careful consideration. The condition of the agricultural labourer is improving, though it still leaves much to be desired. Two family budgets, one for the end of the eighteenth century, the other for January, 1906, are full of significance. In the first the materials for bread cost 6s. 7d. out of a total of 9s. ; in the second, 4s. out of 15s. 5d. Much, of course, remains to be done, but the prospect is not without hope.- In one matter the rural labourer is better off than his fellow of the town, though, indeed, the writer of the article does not seem to think so. He gets for, say, eighteen- pence a week a dwelling which costs seven shillings at the least in a London suburb.—There is a very interesting paper on "English Waterways." It is adverse to the employment of public money in subsidising this mode of transport. The great grievance against railways is that they give the foreigner preferential rates. They even adopt for-him the convenient system of "cash on delivery." But these are not sufficient reasons for spending .4220,000,000 on subsidising canals.—A study of the French Revolution is not inappropriate just now, and the reader will find much to interest him in the article dealing with this subject. There are statesmen who are busily engaged in " letting loose problems and turmoil," to borrow the elegant phrase of Mr. Hilaire Belloc.—We can but mention a very readable article on social history entitled " A Century of Scottish Life," and a fine literary appreciation of Oliver Wendell Holmes.—We cannot speak so well of the essay on Mary Wollstonecraft and Caroline Norton. Of the first we read :—" Biographers have been at needless pains to write an apology for her connection with Imlay." Her moral code was to dispense with marriage, and so, it seems, we are not to blame her. That may suit a problem novel, but it seems a little out of place here. Is it not a case of noeens absolvitur ?—The remaining articles in the number are "Art and Practice," "Minoan Crete," and "The Last Years of the Protectorate."
It is scarcely profitable to write political articles or to criticise what is written when the statesmen in power may make any day a new declaration of policy, or put a new interpretation on
what they have already made. The writer of " Revolution or Reform" in the Quarterly has had to add a postscript in view of
Mr. Asquith's declaration of April 14th. But the title of his article is anyhow more fully justified than ever, and his practical advice becomes more important. This advice is, in brief : Let moderate men unite on the questions of the day such as reform of the Upper House, and give up the food-taxes. If the Tariff Reform leaders refuse, we can only say of them what Gibbon said of the Roman nobles, that they were " more tenacious of property than of freedom," and that they will end by losing both.
—The other directly political paper, " The Referendum and its 'Critics," by Professor Dicey, was mentioned in our issue of the 23rd inst.—The essay entitled " Socialism.—I. Its Meaning and Origin," is chiefly historical. The foundation of Socialism, the writer thinks, is economic reform. That is certainly the aspect which attracts most of its adherents. They hope that it will do away with poverty. Some of us are convinced that it will greatly increase it ; but it is better to postpone the subject till we
see what the writer has to say about "the present position and future prospects of the movement."—One question of foreign polities is directly. discussed in " Greece and King George," and
another, of more importance to ourselves, indirectly in "The
Economic Position of Germany," by Mr. Edgar Crammend. In this some very striking facts and figures are set forth. Prominent
among these is the great increase in the population—from forty-five millions in 1880 to sixty-one millions seven hundred thousand in 1907—and the great transference, in respect of employment, from agriculture to industry and commerce. In 1882 the first numbered 42-51 of the workers as against 45.53 of industry, trade, and commerce; the proportions were changed in 1907 to 28.113 as against 56'16. Emigration has almost_cessed, and the problem of
providing for the rapidly increasing number has become acute. It is to such facts rather than to the assurances of benevo- lent optimists, often covering quite =benevolent designs, that we ought to attend. "The only policy open to this country is a mat permanent increase in the naval expenditure," such is Mr. Crammond's conclusion.—It is certainly a relief to turn to the politics of the past as they are portrayed, as to one of their aspects, in " Society and Politics in the Nineteenth Century." The subject is " Woman in Politics," now presenting itself in a very different form under the auspices of Mrs. Pankhurst and her friends. The social foundation of the new order is wholly changed. Never again shall we have a Cabinet which had a common great-grandmother.—The-other articles are "A Palace in the Syrian Desert," by Miss Gertrude Lowthian Bell; "Early Welsh Poetry," by Professor W. Lewis Jones ; "The Art of Henry James," by Morton Fullerton ; "The New Astronomy " ; "India in the Seventeenth Century," by Professor Stanley Lane-Poole ; and " Ancient and Modern Stoicism." We may say that it is a remarkably good number.
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