Wales a similar movement has been going on since 1851 to the over-stocking of other branches of industry.

To add to this gradual sinking in the scale, of artizans, manufacturers, agricultural labourers, and farmers, we have now the retail distributors, who are being superseded in their occupations by Civil Service, and other co-operative stores all over the kingdom. The consequence is that the great body of what were called the backbone of the country will, in a few years, be among those who have already sunk in the social scale and are at present feeling the pangs of hunger and despair. Sanguine men, hoping against hope, think that, notwithstanding all this hemming-in and black look-out, we shall yet tide over our difficulties as we have done before when things were as bad and the look-out was as black as it is at present. But had we ever before such a rival as America is becoming and will become more and more every year, as to that country our best artizans-driven from our shores by trade restrictions and strikes-and our best agricultural labourers, are continually emigrating. Remedies are put forward to enable us to cope with America, such as "freeing the land from unjust and antiquated restrictions by which it is encumbered; the abolition of the laws of primogeniture and entail, the introduction of an easy and cheap transfer of land, the removal of Game Laws, and the passing of an Agricultural Holdings Act for the benefit of Tenant Farmers." These and other remedies that are put forward by able advocates, are all, no doubt, excellent, but to bring them about in a peaceable way would take at least a generation or two, and, in the meantime, as the old saying has it, while the grass grows the steed starves, unless you give him something else to eat. And it is something to eat that is wanted at once by masses of men and their families in this country who are willing to work at anything and for anything so long as it brings them an honest crust, and keeps them out of the poorhouse. Now the grand practical question at present is, how can superseded labour be employed so that

it may be relieved, and, at the same time, be made to pay? This is a question which occupied my thoughts for many years and, recently, I published a pamphlet through Kent of London, entitled "A Plan for the relief of the Working Classes when out of Employment," in which I showed, among other things, what has been done by Holland in the early part of this century, when, owing to previous revolutions, and years of mercantile depression, she was swarming with beggars to such a fearful degree that they had become an absolute nuisance to the rest of the community. In it I gave an account of a society called the "Beneficence," that was started by some rich, benevolent individual, or individuals, which, aided by the Dutch Government, gave employment to poor families and all who came supplicating for work, on the waste and poor lands of the country. And so well did this society manage its undertaking that, in 1833, fifteen years after the experiment had been commenced, a traveller who made a journey of nearly 500 miles through the country relates that he only noticed three little boys asking for charity, one at Rotterdam and two at Delph. Here, then, is data to go upon. What was done in that country may surely be done in this. In my pamphlet I call upon Government to carry out my plan, but there is reason to doubt whether Government would be likely to succeed with such an undertaking, even if it could be persuaded to adopt it, so well as private individuals; any aid it could bestow, as did the Dutch Government to the "Society of Beneficence," is all that might be expected from it. There are enormously rich men in this country-men said to be worth over three hundred thousand pounds a year. Now these are the men who ought, for their own sakes, to be the founders of a Society of Beneficence in this country. When a revolution is brought about in a country by starving men, who are the first that feel its effects? The revolution in France at the latter end of the last century answers the question. The court, the nobility and the gentry were the first objects of popular

vengeance, and we read, with horror, of the scenes of massacre and outrage which continued for years after that outbreak When it becomes a case of starvation with masses of men, their natures change and they become as merciless as wolves Before things get into this state, would it not be sound policy for those who have wealth in this country to combine and form themselves into a great Joint Stock, Limited Liability Company with the same object as that of the Beneficent Society above referred to, namely, the employing of superfluous labour in fertilizing and cultivating the wastes and poor lands of this country, and large tracts of uncultivated land in our colonies. In addition to cultivating the soil at home and abroad, labour could be employed in building, in manufacturing agricultural implements, in making common household furniture, and, among other things, wearing apparel. The scheme is immense and, of course, would require an immense capital, but, if such rich noblemen as the Duke of Sutherland and the Marquis of Westminster headed the list of 10 shareholders with £100,000 each, it would only be a third of their annual income and would go a good way towards a capital of a million which, I should say, would be required to start such a scheme. Thus, as one of my reviewers, Dr. Nichols, says, "a scheme could be started for destroying poverty, vice and misery at the cost of one of our smallest wars; a scheme which would record no disasters, no killed or wounded or missing; and with no defeats, but most blessed victories." My pamphlet gives the details of such a scheme, the main feature of which, namely, paying officials with the regular currency, and all who applied for work with paper money, could be adopted by a Company, as well as it could by Government. This cheap labour would, in a few years, make the Company's property valuable, especially in the colonies, whilst, by giving employment to all who applied for it, the extreme distress in the country would be allayed, and a safety valve to carry off the dangerous feelings which poverty is apt to engender, be created.

It would, however, lengthen this paper too much to go into further particulars. I will, therefore, conclude by calling upon the reader to reflect on the millions of the trading and working classes whom, in the course of time, such a scheme would provide with employment, and the thousands upon thousands of the middle and educated classes, who are now starving in the professions, who could then be employed as Governors, Directors, Commissioners, Bankers, Surveyors, Clergymen, Surgeons, Schoolmasters, Clerks, Storekeepers, Auctioneers, Sea Captains, Sailors, and so forth.

M. Medrington.

NOTICES OF BOOKS.

MIXED ESSAYS, by MATTHEW ARNOLD. London: Smith, Elder & Co., 1879.

Whatever Mr. Arnold publishes is sure of a hearty welcome from his many admirers, and, although these are always glad when their favourite magazine is enlivened by a contribution from his pen, it is, necessarily, still more satisfactory when his works appear in the handier and more permanent form of a volume. The nine papers which make up the present book have all been printed before,-most of them within the last few years. They are marked by Mr. Arnold's characteristic freshness of style and thought. He discourses, in the first place, on the kindred subjects of "Democracy" and "Equality "-subjects which few are able to touch so clearly and so justly and with such tact and insight as Mr. Arnold. The subject of "Democracy" has engaged the attention of a contributor to the present number of Papers for the Times, and much would be gained if others who discuss it would do so in the impartial and religious spirit of these two writers. Professed lovers of progress should fix in their minds some true conception of

what Democracy and Equality are, and make for that. What some do make for is, unfortunately, a very different and much less worthy thing. Great movements are only retarded when their promoters misapprehend them. Mr. Arnold well says, "This movement of Democracy, like other operations of nature, merits properly neither blame nor praise. Its partizans are apt to give it credit which it does not deserve, while its enemies are apt to upbraid it unjustly. Its friends celebrate it as the author of all freedom. But political freedom may very well be established by aristocratic founders; and, certainly, the political freedom of England owes more to the grasping English barons, than to Democracy. Social freedom-equality,-that is rather the field of the conquests of Democracy."

He

The other essays are not less worthy of attention than those just referred to. In "A Guide to English Literature " Mr. Arnold starts to review Mr. Stopford Brook's Primer of English Literature, and proceeds to expound his own views upon a subject in which he is particularly at home. Other literary studies relate to Milton, Goethe and George Sand. Mr. Arnold brings Religion to bear on all he touches. feels so deeply the truths of Christianity and penetrates so thoroughly the falsehoods which have been mis-called Christian, that he is able to show how direct a bearing Christianity really has on affairs of life and to apply its teachings to movements of the present time. The surface cobwebs which obscure the vision of many people, he lightly sweeps aside, and, with a master's hand, makes manifest whatever is true and lovely and worthy of regard.

PLEASANT WAYS IN SCIENCE, by RICHARD A. PROCTOR. London: Chatto and Windus, 1879.

Here, as elsewhere, Mr. Proctor discourses pleasantly on a variety of subjects. His purpose, as he tells us, "is to interest rather than to instruct." He succeeds in doing both.