The Great Frontier. By Walter Prescott Webb. (Seeker & Warburg.
30s.)
PROFESSOR Wean, who is one of 'America's most distinguished historians, has written an erudite book based on the assumption that European society in the days of Chris- ' topher Columbus was completely "static" and that the discovery of fresh lands by fifteenth, sixteenth and seventeenth century explorers brought about a revitalised era of great prosperity. This "Boom Era" has lasted somewhat more than four, hundred years: and the fact that it is now giving place to a totally different period is causing a profound and uniVersal upheaval. Profes- sor Webb seeks to explain what precisely it is that lays the bed for this vast change. (And in so doing he hopes to render a service to mankind.) His theme is an ambitious one, but it is successfully dealt with because the author makes. the interplay between Europe and the "Great Frontier"—the world which began to be discovered at the end of the fifteenth century—an engrossing study.
Politics, commerce; religion and the arts are all impartially examined throughout this volume which is indeed the product of a most persuasive and attractive intelligence. IX S.
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