THE MAGAZINES.

THE March number of the Contemporary Review is an un- usually readable one. The first article, though intentionally one-sided, is a fine statement of the case against the French,. as a nation shown by their recent history to have become thoroughly demoralised. They are all, says the writer, given up to the desire of physical comfort, which they secure by keeping down their numbers, and to a kind of self-worship which closes their eyes to all unpleasant facts, such, for instance, as their present subjugation to militarism and clericalism. They are willing to sacrifice to the glory of the Army the most elementary ideas of justice, yet they sub- ject the Army to a shameful system of espionage under which officers' letters are opened and read and their secrete. registered and classified. The French people, always the most changeable in Europe, having in a hundred years. denounced and hurrahed for a hundred systems or rulers, now believes the most absurd stories, such as those about the Freemasons, and nevertheless thinks it its mission to diffuse light through Europe. "This changeful people, which has thus substituted ritual for religion, and a belief in the visits. of devils, angels, and Antichrist's grandmother for the simple and sublime teachings of Jesus; which has made the names of liberty, equality, and brotherhood synonymous with a. system of oppression, corrupt favouritism, racial hatred, and ignoble espionage to which Turkey alone offers a suitable parallel; which solemnly raises the negation of all science to. an article of salutary belief ; which delights to drag in the mire to-day the idols to which it offered debasing fetish. worship yesterday ; which systematically contributes to end the French race and ruin the chiTe patrie, lest it should. forfeit some of the petty comforts of life—it is this same people which proudly claims to have been entrusted by heaven with the mission of spreading light among the nations of the earth, and of colonising territories ten. times more extensive than the France which it cannot populate ! " The paper is not, of course, a judgment, but only a piece of invective, but it is interesting from its fearlessness, and because it sums up the opinion of that large section of the,. European world which holds that France is in. literature always too mildly treated. We do not concur in the invective, or forget that below the apparent changeability of France there is a steady resolve to uphold certain fixed ideas, but that France has for the moment become strangely materialised is true, as it is true that first-rate ,ability seema to have temporarily disappeared from among her pro- ducts. There never was a time when there were so fess

great men visible in France.—Mr. A. J. Wilson sends a paper on "The Immorality and Cowardice of Modern Loan- mongers," which is almost as savage as the essay just mentioned, but is rather deficient in detailed facts. Mr. Wilson believes that the great capitalists wish the nations to get into debt, help them to mortgage the future with light hearts, and even, as in some recent instances, e.g., China, try to force loans upon them. He believes that the system of per- petual borrowing must ultimately collapse, and that "a com- bined revolt against the masters in usury is a possibility of the future these leaders and pawnees of republics, kingdoms, and empires should not wholly leave out of view. It might destroy them, and with them much of what is most valuable and precious in the moral and intellectual progress of man- kind." The warning is imperatively required by all countries in Europe, including our own, which is borrowing much too recklessly for municipal purposes, but we question whether the moneylenders are solely or even principally responsible. In some cases, as indeed Mr. Wilson admits, the people have insisted on expenditure, and in others the statesmen have been far too ready to spend, especially upon those military preparations which are now crushing Europe. We wish Mr. Wilson, who knows the subject thoroughly, would state clearly the amount of profit which a lending syndicate clears by the issue of a successful large loan. He would, we believe, open many eyes.— All who care to know what the earliest r aces thought and believed will be interested in Dr. Dillon's account of the story of " Ahikar the Wise," which was in such favour among the Hebrews of the second cen- tury B.C. that it was accepted as history. The tale is, in fact, the earliest form of the novel, and relates how an Assyrian Minister was flung from power, then restored to it, and then used it to extract a vast treasure from Egypt, which he accomplished by always solving the subtle conundrums of the Egyptian King. The story is full, like all Eastern stories, of sayings, which doubtless embodied the wisdom of that age, some of which are penetrated with a spirit of good. mess, and others with what is best described as canniness :— " My son, in the day of thy misfortune upbraid not God, lest when He hear thee He wax wroth with thee. My son, treat not one of thy slaves better than the other, for thou wottest not which of them thou shalt stand in need of in the end. My son, a dog that forsakes his master and follows thee, him smite with stones My son, whosoever judges un- righteously kindles the wrath of God My son, if thou despatch a wise man on thy business, thou needest not give him charge concerning the matter ; but if thou art minded to send a fool, go rather thyself, and send him not My son, better is a bone in thy hand than fat in the pot of other people, and better is a sheep that is near than a cow far off, and better is a sparrow in thy hand than a thousand on the wing, and better is poverty that gathereth in than riches that scatter abroad, and better are the woollen garments that thou art wearing than the fine linen and silk attire which others have on." To a certain order of mind, not the least intelligent, we can hardly imagine a more attractive paper than Dr. Dillon's.—" The Romance of School," by the Warden of GlenalmOnd, has too much gush in it to be of much value, though it is true that boys are chivalrous,—witness the horror of " sneaking ; " and Mr. G. Clarke Nuttall on "The Secret of Baldness" is most disappointing. The secret of baldness is, of course, a microbe, which kills the hairs in succession till the overtasked skin can send out no more, and remains "bald." Heaven forbid that we should question the existence of any microbe anywhere, lest we should be trodden down by a stampede of microscopists, but Mr. Nuttall has not explained why some skins are fatal to microbes—we know one gentleman at least approach- ing seventy whose hair is as thick as when he was twenty— and he admits that as yet there is no remedy. His Majesty Microbius is as completely poison-proof as Mithri- dates. (Might we suggest that as sailors are of all classes the least liable to baldness, common sea-water may be the best remedy ?)—Mr. Mitchell-Innes, lately Colonial Treasurer of Hong-kong, in "The Dragon and the Chrysan- themum" admits all that it is now usual to say about the difference between the Japanese and the Chinese, but con- siders that the " staying-power " of the former is not yet proved, and dwells on the fact, well known in the Far East, that in business the Chinaman is far more honest than his rival. A bargain once "hooked" in China is never departed from, while the Japanese will not adhere to one if it promises loss, or if another customer offers more money.

The Nineteenth Century is full of good papers; two in particular, that on Austria-Hungary by Dr. Emil Reich, and that on Manchuria by Captain F. Younghasband, being important additions to current information. We have noticed the first-named elsewhere. Captain Younghusband acknow- ledges that Russia must obtain Manchuria in the end, but contends, contrary to English general opinion, that in obtain- ing it she will acquire a magnificent property. The province, he says, which, we may mention, is twice as large as France, possesses a coast-line of six hundred miles and great navig- able rivers like the Amoor, the Ussuri, and the "mighty" Sangari, which, even at Kirin, in the heart of the land, is twenty feet deep. The soil is of most unusual fertility, producing millet, wheat, rice, and indigo in profusion ; while huge tracts are covered with fine pasture, and others equally huge with the hard-wood timber, of which in other regions the supply is becoming exhausted:— " 'When I was in Delagea Bay a short time ago an American timber merchant, who had imported to the Transvaal hundreds of thousands of tons of timber from so distant parts as British Columbia and Puget Sound, asked me if I knew of any place where there were forests of hard-wood timber still remaining. I naturally at once referred him to those great forests of Man- churia in which we had spent so many dreary weeks, and I spoke of the view I had had from the summit of the Ever White Mountain, where I had looked down from a height of 8,000 feet upon unbroken forest extending away as far as the eye could reach in every direction. And I told my American friend how, from the slopes of that central mountain, there radiated three great rivers on which I had seen huge rafts of timber gliding noiselessly towards the sea. With political obstacles removed Manchuria could compete with British Columbia in the timber trade of the world."

Gold, copper, iron, and coal are found within a few miles of one another, while the inhabitants, twenty millions in number, are strong, quiet, inured to regular labour, and inclined, for purely business reasons, when they strike a bargain to adhere to it. The climate is that of Eastern Canada, very cold and very hot, and the rainfall, as in all countries with wide forest tracts, is ample, yet not destructive. That is clearly a province with a great trading future.—Prince Kropotkin draws a pleasant picture of Canada, in which the newest information, perhaps, is that the settlements of the Mennonites (Russian Quakers) are succeeding. Poverty is unknown among them, though they are exceedingly prolific, and many among them become very wealthy. They still retain their practice of living in communities, and rejecting the control of law, but there is bitter resistance to the despotiem of the elders, and one-third of all the young men wander away. The destiny of the Mennonites, who all accept the Bible as the rule of life, is clearly to populate and cultivate the waste, and then disappear, except as a Nonconformist sect, in the general body of the population.—Lord Napier of Magdala sends a paper on the North-West Frontier, which has the unusual merit of being brief, and indeed condenses into a single paragraph every argument yet employed to defend the "Forward" policy :— " Looking, then, at the main features of the problem—the responsibility that is already ours in the eyes of our neighbours ; the nature of the frontier country, which lends itself to the formation of a series of strongholds of disorder ; the increasing tendency of the tribes to acquire military efficiency and the most modern weapons—it seems clear that some control up to the Afghan frontier should be arrived at. The alternative is a return to the recent very dangerous situation—the tribes, left to themselves except when they become intolerable, daily becoming stronger and better armed, daily becoming more liable to influ- ences from without hostile to us, and looking always at their interests as opposed to ours. Well armed, they would be secure in their fastnesses, and would be masters of our frontier ; the result of all the recent expenditure of life and treasure being a last state worse than the first."

Lord Napier would, therefore, concentrate effort upon the Afridis, and would, if needful, subjugate them by preventing them from cultivating till they submit. That is quite de- finite and feasible besides, at a certain cost in life and money; but Lord Napier has forgotten one factor in the problem. What sort of an enemy would this tribe be, thus starved into submission, if ever it got the chance? We want our Indian Highlanders to cut Russian throats, not ours.—Dr. Jessopp finishes his account of "The Great Pillage," the spoliation of the parishes at the time of the suppression of the monasteries, and makes out a remarkable case;

but as no remedy is now possible the ordinary reader will perhaps turn to two more exciting papers,—Mr. Lilly's account of "The Methods of the Inquisition" and Lady Jersey's curious story of two "White Slaves" in Hayti. The method of the Inquisition, as described on authority by a fervent Catholic, was simply to torture a witness till he gave an answer which the Inquisitors believed. Mr. Lilly abhors the cruelty of the system, but says it was not worse than that of some secular Courts. Possibly; but is that the point ? Is it not rather this, that these priests claimed to be better than laymen and were, if :Anything, worse ? Lady Jersey's story is a frightful account of the horrors inflicted on the whites by the emancipated negroes of Hayti. We wish, as she has studied the subject, that she would explain why French negroes hated their masters so much worse than English negroes. Neither in the West Indies nor in the Southern States have the negroes ever betrayed the excessive cruelty of the Haytian blacks, while the negroes of the Spanish half of the island have been comparatively reasonable beings. Why F—Mrs. R. M. King cautions all who take chloroform to inhale it at a little distance from the instru- ment. If the respirator is pressed over the face the patient feels strangled. That is true, if the patient resists; but, except in rare cases, is it true if he yields, and inhales as if the chloroformed air were only air ? We speak from experi- ence when we say "No."

The Fortnightly Review this month has several papers of considerable interest. Baron Pierre de Coubertin contributes an article on the position of the French Army—" Contradic- tions of Modern France : the Military Paradox "—which, though containing much that is striking and important, would have been much improved by being more specific and less general. He mentions that General Jamont has quietly succeeded General Saussier as " Generalissimo " of the French Army, and tells us that if war broke out he would command all the forces which "France would pour out over the Frontiers." "In two months' time his fame would be echoing through the whole world, and would endure through several centuries of history." That being so, one would like to know what manner of man General Jamont is. Unfortunately we are told nothing as to his personal characteristics or his military record. Incidentally Baron Pierre de Conbertin declares that though Mr. Bodley in his new book has got "most of his facts about France right, he has contrived to give an utterly false impression all round."—" The French on the Nile," by Mr. Edwards, is full of geographical details, and will delight those who care for big maps. The writer states what we believe to be true,—namely, that it was not a French, but an Abyssinian force which reached Fashoda last year under a Frenchman, Captain Clochette. Mr. Edwards apparently believes that though one section of the Marchand Expedition was destroyed, another section—that under M. Liotard—has also reached Fashoda, and has by this time steamers floating on the Nile. These facts seem to Mr. Edwards very grave, and so in a sense they are. If, however, our Government remains firm, and resolutely refuses to recognise the French in these regions except as private travellers, no great harm will come of it. When we reach Fashoda, and we shall do so as soon as we have taken Khartoum, our position will be infinitely stronger than that of the French. In our opinion the French are not likely to give us so much anxiety as the Abyssinians. Mr. Rodd has proved, however, that Menelek is not unreasonable, and by no means inclined to play blindly the game of France.—In "Methods of Voting" Mr. Howe describes a voting machine which will save the voter almost the whole of the trouble of voting, and also count the votes almost automatically. The voter when he gets into the voting place will find himself confronted with a number of handles— apparently like those behind a bar—inscribed with the candi- dates' names. He will pull out or down that marked with the name of his choice, and his vote will instantly be registered. The suggested machine is ingenious, but we do not suppose it will ever be adopted. The British public does not like innovations, especially in politics. "These patent things are never no good" is a universal British sentiment, and only breaks down when the improvement can be shown to pay. But no one would gain anything by a new-fangled system of voting.—In "Tragedy and Mr. Stephen Phillips" Mr. William Watson strongly condemns the notion that poets should find their tragic scenes in humble life. The very essence of tragedy, says Mr. Watson, is "the overthrow of something great" :—

"But when our young modern poet takes one of the nameless aggregated minions, who, in the words of Milton,

' Grow up and perish as the summer dr:

and describes her gradual descent into the vulgarest vice from a. level of what appears to have been hardly less vulgar virtue, and when we are bidden by his undiscriminating critics to acquiesce, in this as tragedy, I, for one must protest with whatever- emphasis I can command. In these insignificant and immemor. able human lives, no material of tragedy exists ; these trivial and microscopical individualities do not provide the theatre in. which alone may tragedy be enacted. Tragedy demands, as the- prime condition of its presentment, a moral stage of some- grandeur and amplitude. A. great or splendid spirit is wrecked, or overborne, or gradually disintegrated, and in the terror of such a spectacle there is sublimity and awe. If a palace or a fortress fall, we tremble; we do not stand aghast at the collapse- of a mud hut."

There is, of course, a certain truth in this, but it is not,. in our opinion, the whole truth. Jean Francois Millet, in dealing with the delusion that anything would do for the subject of a picture if only the painting were good, said finely : " L'art ne vit que de passion et on ne pout pm se passionner pour rien." Passion is the essence of poetry as of art, and a poet cannot find passion in what is mean, or trivial. But is the atrophy of a human soul, however- miserable and humble, a mean or trivial subject fb Assuredly not. We must not leave Mr. Watson's interest- ing paper without noticing the warm and generous praise which he bestows on a poet younger than himself in years and fame. Nothing could be more sympathetic and more appreciative than the way in which he speaks of Mr. Phillips's "Christ in Hades" and also of " Marpessa." This attitude towards his fellow-servant of the Muses is worthy of the best traditions of English literature.

The National Review has another article from Mr. Blake in regard to the future of Rhodesia. Mr. Blake persists in his former declarations that the country is of very little value agriculturally, that there is no paying gold in it, and that the railway to Bulawayo is not in any sense a serious line. The agri- cultural value of Rhodesia is, in our opinion, still undecided,. in spite of the assertions, more or less to the contrary, quoted by Mr. Blake, but made by such authorities as Sir Gordon Sprigg, and even Mr. Rhodes himself. "We stand or fall by our gold" is given as one of Mr. Rhodes's utterances. As to- the gold, Mr. Blake's point is as follows. He points out that though the Company have been in possession for some four or five years, and have plenty of money and every inducement to. prove that paying gold does exist, they have failed to de so. Yet we know that the country has been hunted over by

prospectors in every direction :—

"But, it will be asked, what, during the last fire years, could the Company have done ? What steps could they have taken to answer that burning question whether permanent reefs exist or not ? I will tell you. There are three things they might have done : (1) They might have sent up well known mining experts,. men of recognised authority in the mining world, to examine and report, and then have published their reports. (2) They might have sent up a battery or two by bullock wagon and set to work crushing vigorously and opening up the reef, and here again made all results public. And (3) they might have used a diamond drill, which is easily transported and worked, to make borings, and so prove the continuation of this reef at deep levels. Thesesimple and effective means they might have taken, and these means they would have taken, if they had not had good reason to dread the result. This is evident, because up to a.. certain point these means were actually adopted. As for drills which are in constant use on the Band for finding the depth and position of the reef, I never heard of their being used in Rhodesia, except, curiously enough, for the finding of coal, and that was right up on the Zambesi. Does it not seem odd that drilling should be sunk for coal on the Zambesi, yet not sunk for gold within twenty miles of Buluwayo ? The suggestion : They sunk for coal because they expected to find it, but they did not sink for gold because they did not expect to find it. Of mining experts, I know that two at least were sent up to report, but. where are their reports ? There are plenty of men whom no one ever heard of attached to the various Buluwayo syndicates, who are ready to assay your mine up to anything you please, and guarantee its life till the crack of doom. What we want is an opinion of recognised authority. Give us the opinion of Mr. Charles Rolker, or Mr. Hennen Jennings, or Mr. H. C. Perkins, or. Mr. A. P. Sawyer. All these gentlemen either are or have been in South Africa. It is not too much to say that the favourable reports of any one of them would go far to put Rhodesia right again with the mining world. Is it then credible that the Company should have had such a chance of establishing its reputation as the presence of these men gave, and never have used it ? Perhaps they did employ some of them. Perhaps two, at least, at different times, were tried. Will the Company tell us if this is so ? Did they send up two of these experts ? Which two ; and above all, ish.re are their reports? I challenge the Company to answer me these questions."

We do not, of course, profess to be gold experts, and so cannot say whether there is or is not some defence for the non-materialisation of the Rhodesian gold-mines; but it

certainly does seem most strange that after all these years of waiting the matter has not been decided one way or another. Mr. Blake, quoting the Pall Mall Gazette, states

that the British investor has already sunk twenty-four millions sterling in Rhodesian mines, and in his opinion this

money is gone never to return.—In "Face to Face in West Africa" Admiral Maxse puts clearly and forcibly the main outline of the West African situation, and shows how

" difficult " have been the French, and on the whole how patient the British, negotiators. We fear he is not far from the mark when he says that the French idea of negotiation is "to claim everything and to yield nothing."—General Balwer's paper on "The British Army" is full of the admissions which are now so general among the defenders of the existing Army system. The short-service system, he tells us, has never been properly worked in accordance with the principles of 1872.

The first paper in Blackwood, on "The Cries of Paris," deals with the Dreyfus case, but adds nothing new to the controversy.—Far more interesting and readable is the

really remarkable paper on "German Country Life." It describes the life led by the Junkers on their estates.

Apparently the normal Junker is a sort of mixture of the most arbitrary of English squires of fifty years ago and of a close-fisted farmer of the least amiable type. The writer of the article, Mr. G. W. Steevens, who seems to be a very intelligent observer, notes that the peasants, though they Lave a good deal of book learning, are very clownish and unintelligent. They are dull and slow-minded, and have

never learned to think. "The farm-labourer in Germany is in effect a house-servant. Indeed he is almost adscriptus glebw—a superior kind of serf." The account of the political, or rather fiscal, aspirations of the Junker is very noteworthy. —" Witchcraft and Christianity" is an article full of queer stories, or rather hints of stories, but it wants co-

herence and detail. One good witch-trial well described would have been more satisfactory.

M. de Pressensa in his "Revue du Mois," appearing in this month's Cosmopolis, points to the sinister clouds gathering

since 1394 from all directions on the British horizon. Lord Salisbury, he fears, is not the favourite of fortune,—witness political defeats abroad, and a carriage accident at home. We should have thought the escape alluded to might have been considered as a proof of luck. M. de Pressense promises in some future number to rehearse the list of England's misfortunes during the past four years, " une vraie aerie is la noir." America and Spain, too, it seems, are pursued by a blind malevolent fate:—" Les causes accidentelles de malen- tencla entre les Etats-Unis et l'Espagne n'ont que trop abonde dans ces derniers temps : on aurait vraiment dit, 1 de certains moments, d'une lutte inegale engagee entre la bonne volont6 d'hommes peinetres de la gravit6 de leurs obligations et resoltis tout faire pour eviter une rupture, et la malveillance aveugle

d'une espece de fatalit6 acharnee Is multiplier lea occasions de conflit." Has the editor of the Daats been studying Greek tragedy too deeply lately, or why this constant appeal to

Nemesis ? However, he soon comes back to French common- sense, and hopes each country may be able to "mIster leurs chauvins."—Mr. Arthur Symons sends six Hogarthian word.

pictures of Naples, of Naples seen close,—not far off in its beautiful setting. He shows us winding, filthy streets in the brilliant sun, where a "malodorous medley is a-swarm," "streets which are corridors with their violent shadows and obscure exuberance of life." "The odours of the city," he says, "mounted to my head like some horrible fume, enveloped me with disgust, and possessed me with terror." This is how he sums up Naples : "No, there never was a town so troubling, so disquieting, so incalculable, with its heavenly bay lying out in front for strangers to gaze at, and all this gross, contentedly animal life huddled away in its midst like some disgraceful secret." —Mr. Zangwill's story, "The Maker of Lenses," is finished this month. We think the sketch of Spinoza would have been better in essay form. The love-story is really too slight to build upon, though if it is true it would have ornamented a serious paper.—George Meredith sends an "Ode in Con- tribution to the Song of French History," called "The Revolution." Those who do not admire Mr. George Meredith will not get through it ; those who do may perhaps under- stand it. It contains many fine lines and much raw material which would have been poetry in the hands of a poet.— " Out of the Cage," by F. W. Robinson, is a sordid little story of a woman who escapes from prison only to find her husband unfaithful and her child dead. She begs a policeman to take her "home,"—i.e., back to gaol.