THE GRAVER MAGAZINES.

THE grave Magazines are doing their first work, the exhaustive discussion of the topic of the day, very well this month. They

publish seven, or, we may say, eight papers on the "Rehousing the Poor," and those who read them will find their materials for thought upon the subject distinctly increased. The most important is, of course, Mr. Chamberlain's, in the Fortnightly, which we commented on last week; but Miss Octavia Hill's, in the Nineteenth Century, is full of experience and sense, Mr. Glazier's states the working-man's views, and Mr. Brooke Lambert and Mr. Mearns in the Contemporary once more dilate on the magnitude of the evil. The feeling of the man who reads them all will be, we think, that the physical difficulty—the actual badness of the houses—could be conquered, if we could get over the recklessness of the very poor about the state of the cloa.cre, which again could, we believe, be mastered, if they were once shown how miasma affects strength, and this for less expenditure than is at present believed. Mr. Glazier, the working-man, presses the case against the tenants with especial force ; and we have never been able to believe that his remedy, the removal of the poor to better working towns outside London, is im- practicable. All the papers are worth study, and the tone of all is even strangely healthy, after the screaming we have heard,

the strongest philanthropists having evidently learned wisdom from their experience. We do not exclude from this praise Mr. A. Austin's sermon on the duty of the rich to be more moderate

in their expenditure on themselves. It is absolutely sound, though we fear that he will find his principles are only "laws without sanction." In a world in which a large proportion dis- believe in a future state, and another large proportion hold the cure of social evils absolutely hopeless, the advice to practise economy

and give away surplus wealth is likely to be regarded by the rich as a counsel of perfection. It seems to those who spend as

if they could not help it, and to those who save as if hoarding were so wise. The rich are not wiser than the prosperous, or

the prosperous than the well-to-do, and to how many among those two classes is the great gift of financial fortitude given ?

Do we not all, Mr. A. Austin included, look forward with a certain dread, as if comfort were insecure ? The publication of so many sensible and right-minded papers—none of them dull, either—upon such a subject, in journals necessarily anxious to be popular, is a good sign of the times.

So is the paper in the Contenzporary, by Mr. S. Smith, the Liberal Member for Liverpool, upon "The Nationalisation of the Land." Mr. Smith has the reputation of a philanthropist who is in theory almost a Socialist. He is utterly* opposed to great estates, to entail and settlement, and to the inequalities

of assessment, which are very gross, and is favourable to the limitation of absolute property in land—forbidding, for ex- ample, clearances to make deer-forests—but he speaks of the destruction of private right in land with hearty detestation. In language which all can understand, be shows that civilisation begins when individual property in land is allowed, and that ownership by the State means universal pauperism :—

"We still have in active existence every form of human society, from the most barbarous to the most refined. We still see a large part of the earth tenanted by races as primitive in their habits as our forefathers were when they were clothed with skins of beasts and possessed the soil of this island in common. Nearly all Africa, considerable portions of North and South America, a large portion of Central Asia, the interior of Australia, New Guinea, and many other islands of Polynesia are all in that state of primitive simplicity. In these regions the land is not appropriated, it is either the common possession of the tribe or the battle-ground of contending tribes. Now, Mr. George gravely assumes that all our modern poverty and degradation are the result of private land-ownership, that all would disappear if we reverted to the happy Arcadian times when land- communism prevailed ; and it is natural for us to ask whether we find an absence of poverty and degradation among those portions of mankind who have preserved the primitive tradition unimpaired."

He proves that in England all forms of wealth have increased much faster than rental, and that the condition of the people, Without private property in land, America and Australia would not have been settled, for such property is the settler's hope ; and he shows conclusively that in practice the alternatives for this country, if it adopted "nationalisation," would be theft on a colossal scale, or severe taxation. Even if the State bought all private land by an issue of Consols, it must raise 2,000 millions at three per cent., to let the land again to the people at two and a half per cent., a rental which every voter would be striving to reduce. The whole paper is most able, and the more important, because Mr. Smith entirely acknowledges the misery around. M. Emile Laveleye's sketch of the position of the French Republic is interesting, but not novel. He sees the diffi- culty of managing foreign politics under a regime of change, and would have France adopt a policy of "frank neutrality;" but will Frenchmen permit that? He does not believe that any system will be accepted in France except the Republican, because any other must be clerical ; but has he quite thought out the possibilities of Ciesarism P Does anything in nature forbid an Agnostic Camar, or a Marcus Aurelius ? Would not a Julian Bonaparte be very nearly in his place in Paris ? We commend to all readers Mr. Goldwin Smith's eloquent defence of Christianity as the most fruitful of creeds, to which we may hereafter recur, —a defence the more remarkable because it is not written from the believer's point of view. Mr. Seebohm, in his paper on proportionate representation, certainly shows that a city divided into wards might be unfairly represented, the majority of Liberal working-men, for instance, being congregated in special wards, while a small majority of Tories abode in the remainder, but he does not show that this is not an inherent difficulty in any scheme of representation which would be accepted. He him- self is in favour of a large extension of three-cornered con- stituencies, but would, as regards them, adopt Mr. Fawcett's proposal :—" He suggests that each voter should have as many votes as there are Members to be elected, and that he should be able to give all these votes to one candidate, or to divide them (quail?, between such candidates as he supports. He suggests that the division of the votes might be perfectly easily arranged in the counting-up of the totals." The effect of this would be in practice that thd majority, disciplined by Committees, would return all three Members. If it did not, the old difficulty of the bye-election would recur; and Mr. Seebohm's suggestion for meeting it, that a vacancy should vacate all the seats, is hopeless, as, indeed, he himself perceives.

The diary of the Marquis Tseng, in the Nineteenth Century, and "The Ideas of an Exile," by a brother of the Khedive, in the Fort nightly, are neither of them of much interest. Prince Ibrahim Hilmy defends his father, Ismail, in a rather feeble way, as the author of Egyptian nationality and the founder of Egyptian Constitutionalism—he was probably the most utter and con- sistent despot who ever lived—and. the Marquis Tseng indulges in vague reflections on the greatness of China. He is observant, however, and his remarks on the entire failure of China to obtain Western allies, and the success of the Japanese in the same object, reveal a certain impartiality. The Marquis sees clearly that the isolation of China is in great part her own fault, and is not, as most Chinamen think, beneficial. The most characteristic passage is an account of an interview with the Brazilian Minister, who called on him in London, and wanted a treaty, with permission to import coolies. It may be doubted if Tseng quite knew where Brazil was, but the serene polite- ness with which he snubbed the unlucky Minister, and told him to wait till the Treaties with the Great Powers were revised, is most characteristic. Sir Charles Duffy sends to the Nineteenth Century another of those long-drawn complaints of the treatment of Ireland which are so often true, but which always rouse in English minds the sensation caused in a husband by his wife's nagging. Sir Charles, admitting that education in Ireland is now denominational, complains that the teachers are starved, and denounces the unfairness with which Ireland is treated in the matter of the franchise. He repeats the old and melancholy story of the tithe war, ex- DOses the imperfections of the municipal system, and denounces

tried by an infallible test, their consumption of food, has im- proved in forty years nearly one hundred per cent. ; the average consumption of tea, sugar, wheat, and meat per head having been as follows :—

Tea oze. 22 73 Sugar lbs. 15 54 Wheat „ 269 353 Meat ), 84 118

1840. 1888.

the Irish Poor Law,—mainly, it would seem, because it offers relief in poor-houses, instead of through public works. Most of the complaints are true, but Sir Charles nowhere makes the' slightest allusion to the present readiness of the Liberals to. reform them all, and that at once, if only the Irish Radicals would allow Parliament to get to work. His idea is evidently that the English never grant anything they can help, and when they do, spoil it by their meanness..

A recent visit to the Boers, by Sir R. Loyd-Lindsay, M.P.,. is a very rough sketch of Cape society ; but it leaves a dis- tinct impression of the deep fissure between the Dutch and English in the colony, and of the craving among the Dutch for labour laws closely approximating to slave

laws. Sir Robert evidently believes that severe treatment of the Transvaal might have induced both the Orange River Free State and the Dutchmen of Cape Colony to join them, and expects that the next elections will result in a Dutch majority in Parliament. The Dutch are everywhere in South Africa the landholding class, the English, though more energetic than their rivals, always retaining the hope of escaping from the colony.

The general effect of the sketch, as of every other we have ever read, is one of regret that we ever took the country, or interfered with the straggle which must have arisen between the Dutch and the natives, who are becoming far too numerous to allow of true colonisation. A most amusing account of covert- shooting, by Mr. Bromley-Davenport, concludes the number..

It is full of vivid sketches, and of stories like this :—

"Another host, who combined a highly religions temperament with an uncontrollable temper, on something going wrong with the beat, burst into paroxysms of fury with his keeper, to whom he used most unparliamentary language. A minute or two afterwards, having cooled down again, he called the man up to him, and asked in subdued and penitent accents, What did I call you just now, Smith ?'—' Well, Sir,' Smith replied, not without a tone of pardonable soreness, you called me a d—d infernal fool !'—'Did I, Smith, did I really ? I'm very Berri. Oh! to think that one Christian man should use such language as that to another ! Heaven 'forgive me ! But,' he shouted in stentorian tones, as his rage suddenly returned, it's God's truth all the same !' "

Mr. Auberon Herbert, in the Fortnightly, scolds away, in his character of "a politician in trouble about his soul," even more vigorously than ever. He writes so well, that we heartily regret he is not editor of a Tory daily paper, to wake us up to a sense of our sins every morning ; but he has at bottom only one corn- plaint,—that politicians are not individual enough. He would like each star to run its course by itself, and thinks a horse dis- honest for pulling in team. Well, that side of the question needs stating, but if every representative is to represent himself only, where are the people to find representatives? A general acceptan ce of Mr. Herbert's views would end in the appointment of a Parlia- ment avowedly composed of paid Delegates alone, which is not precisely what he wants. If a Parliament does not represent, what is the use of it? He says the Spectator would be happier for a little more courage in sinning; bat he would be happier if politicians were a little more slavish, and admitted their inten- tion to be slaves. He exaggerates, we believe, the deference paid to the democracy, and certainly exaggerates the conscious- ness of those who pay it. They think, for the most part, that they are expressing their own opinions. Mr. Andrew Lang's "In the Wrong Paradise" is a cynical joke upon the tendency of all races to evolve Heaven not out of their thoughts, but out of their instincts ; so that an English Protestant, finding himself in the Ojibbeway or Mahommedan Paradise, might think himself in hell. But the most readable article of the number is, perhaps, Mr. A. Forbes's, on "Fire Disci- pline." This is a grave complaint that modern English discipline teaches the soldiers to shirk death, rather than to die. There is too much "dodging to cover," and, as a consequence, when brave men have to be met face to face, as on Majuba Hill, the English run away. Mr. Forbes hardly allows enough for the English necessity for sparing men. Very few Speicherens would consume the British Army, and if we can win without losing a third of the soldiers, all is gained. There is, however, a truth in his view, though we should attri- bute the English occasional failures rather to a general de- ficiency of discipline than to a special drill. The modern English- man forgets the Roman maxim that a soldier should be more afraid of his officers than of the enemy. The illustrations of his thesis from the Egyptian campaign, which was a credit- able and not a discreditable one, are well worked out; but was there ever a victory which was not within a hair's-

breadth of being a defeat? Suppose the French had won Gravelotte, as for one hour it seemed they would. Mr. Broad.

ley, Arabi's counsel, exposes "Turkish intrigues in Egypt," which have for their object, he says, to support any one who will acknowledge the Sultan as direct Sovereign of the Delta. Mahommed. Zafr, the Sultan's spiritual director, who at the time was all-powerful in Yildiz Kiosk, expressed this view to Arabi, in a letter published by Mr. Broadley, expressly saying that the Sultan trusted neither Ismail, nor Hahn, nor Tewfik, but would confide in any one who gave "free course to his firmans." We do not know that any competent observer ever doubted this, but the evidence collected by Mr. Broadley is curious.

We have already mentioned Mr. Austin's paper in the National Review, but the most characteristic is Thomas Tantivy's, on the question "Will Party Government Continue to Work ?" He maintains that the Whigs are dead, their real principle having been oligarchical government; that the Tories are transmuting themselves ; and that a new party is rising,

which at heart is opposed to the Constitution. This, though crudely stated, may be accepted for the moment as true, at least if by the Constitution is meant the aristocratic Constitution ; but having stated this truth, what does Mr. Tantivy advise ? That the Tories should attract the Moderate Liberals—who are officers without an army—by proclaiming their principles- strongly, giving up the spirit of caste, and studying the ideas of the Democracy. "Courage, wisdom, and honesty, the hope of the future lies in these." Precisely; but how does that help Tories to see how their courage is to be displayed, what is the course of wisdom, and where honesty resides ? The aristocracy, says Thomas Tantivy, must "lead the democracy," and the danger may be over; but whither 2—" Two words came into my mind, as sug- gesting the most powerful defence against the antagonism of classes and the disintegration of Empire. They were, Noblesse oblige." But what are the nobles, if they accept the principle, to do ? It is a little funny, by the way, to find the National Review saying of itself that the "dormant talent" has woke up. If it has, it is rubbing its eyes still, as if a little dazed with its untimely waking from slumber.