192 



The Review of Reviews. 



August 1, 1906. 



THE FORTNIGHTLY REVIEW. 



The Fortnightly Beview for June is a fair average 

 number. Count Tolstoy finishes his gruesome tale of 

 the imprisonmeat and suicide of a politipal prisoner. 

 It is interesting as an analj'sis of the sensations of a 

 revolutionist condemned to solitary confinement. 



THE CHANCES OF CHEISTIANITY IN CHINA. 

 Mr. Archibald R. Colquhoun is somewhat despond- 

 ing as to the chances of Christianity in China. He 

 says : — 



The conviction of sin and the longing for salvation do 

 not ent«r into tlie Chinaman's purview of life, and when 

 we reflect, that many things which we call sin are virtues 

 in his eyes it is hard to see how we are to bring these 

 things home to him. 



tary oratory. More work and less talk is a good enough 

 Parliamentary maxim, but — it depends on the work. Il 

 the aspirations of the Social-Labourists appear mighty, 

 let ns rememljer Horace's potter, who conceived a priceless 

 amphora and produced— a highly respectable porridge pot. 



He consoles us by reflecting that — 



Chinese philosophy and morality are breaking down of 

 themselves before the impact of materialism, and, dark as 

 the outlook has been and still is for the spread of the 

 dogmas of Cliristianity, there is reason to believe that the 

 efforts of Christian men to raise the Chinese standard at 

 just those points where it is lowest— in humanitarianism, 

 respect for women, and other respects — will eventually win 

 for the religion which prompted them a recognition which 

 no propagandism could attain. 



EDUCATE THE WOMEN OP EGYPT. 

 At every turn we are being reminded that it is no 

 use to try to raise humanity until the rights of women 

 as human beings are recognised. Sir Walter Mieville, 

 in a most interesting article, entitled " Tlie Fellah's 

 Yokemate," says: — 



Zobehr. the sometime Suitan of Darfour, once said to me 

 that if England really meant to destroy the slave traffic 

 root and branch, tlie British officials must not shrink 

 before the difficult and delicate problem of the education 

 of Egyptian women. He contended that while hareems 

 exist^ slavery would continue, but that with education 

 the hareem system would die a natural death, as educated 

 women would not submit to hareem life. In Egypt the 

 Bexes, according to the latest census, are practically eauallv 

 divided, yet for every illiterate man there are ten illiterate 

 women, 



•Something has boen begun in female education, but 

 it is as yet miserably inadequate to their needs. 



SIR RICHARD AND LADY BURTON, 



" Ouida " has broken her prolonged silence in order 

 to say a woixl for her old friend Sir Richard Burton 

 and another against Lady Isabel. She denounces in 

 her xisual style the folly and wickedness of Govern- 

 ments which made Sir Richard a consul and Matthew 

 Arnold a school inspector. " The beheading of Walter 

 Raleigh was, I think, a kinder treatment than the 

 imprisonment of Burton in Trieste." As for Lady 

 Isabel, she says: — 



Like all her family, she was a devoted Catholic; this 

 bigotry increased with years, and after Burton's death 

 became so great that it made her actually burn the MS. 

 of one of hia most precious translations, because she 

 deemed it of immoral tendency. This act, I confess, I 

 could never pardon her; and I never spoke or wrote to 

 her after the irreparable act. 



A CYNICAL VIEW OF THE LABOUE PARTY. 

 Mr. Benjamin Taylor, in an article on " Labourism 

 in Parliament," indulges in a somewhat cynical chuckle 

 over the difficulties and divisions of the Labour Party. 

 He says : — 



If a survey of the situation reveals anything, it is that 

 Labourism and Socialism are inextricably mixed up, and 

 that neither knows where the one begins and the other 

 ends. But it also reveals the fact that .among the Labour 

 Party in the Houso of Commons are many able and earnest 

 men, whose strong common sense and practical patriotism 

 will not allow faction to altogether override reason. 



To do them justice, the Labourists are more intent on 

 retting measures into shape for entrenching the waa-e- 

 jarnera as a specially privileged class than on Parllamen- 



THE MONTHLY REVIEW. 



The distinction of the June number is Mr. William 

 Archer's memoir of his meetings with Ibsen. Mr. More- 

 ton Frewen's glowing description of our East African 

 protectorate — "the dominion of palm and pine" in 

 close proximity — may stand next. It is a region where 

 the white child'and the banana flourish together. Two 

 hundred miles from the sea coast rises the favoured 

 plateau, 5000 feet above sea-level, unsurpassed for 

 sport, soil and scenery. Tomatoes and the Cape 

 gooseberry grow wild and plentiful as blackberries at 

 home. It is an ideal white man's home, if anything 

 too bracing, exactly under the Equator, with heavy 

 frosts at night. It is not yet a poor man's land; 

 Indian labour makes white labour at present unre- 

 munerative. But capitalists with not less than £1.300 

 would find it a most attractive land. The rnosquito 

 is practically unknown. When the Cape to Cairo rail- 

 way is ctMuplete, it will be only ten days from London. 



What English landlords might do is succinctly 

 stated by Mr. Algernon Turnor ; they can employ a 

 skilled expert, to advise their tenants ; discuss best 

 methods of training future landlords; offer to let 

 small plots of arable land near towns and villages ; 

 and promote a more rational education of the children 

 in botany, entomology, etc. 



C4SSELL'S MAGAZINE. 



Mr. Harry Furniss has an article in the June 

 number of CasseU's Magazine, which, he calls " To 

 Succeed in Parliament." He offers some advice on the 

 art of public speaking. 



Aspiring politicians, he says, spend time and money 

 in being coached by experts — experts in acting, how- 

 ever, and not in speaking. Speaking is a lost art on 

 the stage, in Parliament, and in the pulpit of the 

 Established Church. The best education for the public 

 speaker is the Nonconformist pulpit. 



He advises aspiring legislators to join a mock parlia- 

 ment, or. better stUl. a lower-class debating society, 

 such as the old "Codger's Hall,'' for such places are 

 open to all, and there a man may conceal his identity, 

 rise and speak to strangers, and meet men more prac- 

 tised and more brilliant than he would find in a 

 dilettante parliament. 



Mr. R. de Cordova devotes an article to the art of 

 Mr. R. Caton Woodville, the battle-painter and black 

 and white artist. One of his pictures was " The 

 Jameson Raid," and when it was completed certain of 

 the prisoners whose portraits were in the picture 

 beggp<l him not to exhibit it till after the trial, fear- 

 ing that if the picture were shown then their sen- 

 tences might be doubled. 



THE EMPIRE REVIEW. 



The Empire Rcvigw. a good number, contains the 

 Prince of Wales's speech after his Indian tour, various 

 Colonial articles, noticed separately, and the first in- 

 stalment of a curious, very bloodthirsty legend of the 

 Sea-Dyaks — head hunters, of coin-se — as abundantly 

 appears in the legend, which is a very interesting one. 



A WORD FOR GERMANY. 

 Contrasting with the abuse of Germany, to which we 

 have been too much accustomed of late, Mr. Edward 

 Dicey devotes an article, entitled "The Sinai Penin- 

 sula," to recording our indebtedness to her for having 



