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The Review of Reviews. 



October 1. 1906. 



THE ARENA. 



The Arena for July is as brisk and strenuous as 

 ever. Noticed elsewlieie are the editor's sketcli of the 

 judge who refoi ms drunkards, and Mr. French's pro- 

 posal for pensions for all at the beginning and end of 

 life. Mr. L. F. C. Garvin presents as the alt.ernatire 

 solutions of the Labour problem. State Socialism or 

 Mr. Henrv Georges single tax. He finds in favour of 

 the latter. The editor sketches Mr. E. W. Retlfield. 

 " an artist of winter-locked nature," who works as a 

 gardener and cai-penter in the summer, and painter 

 of winter scenes when the snow falls. Mr. Carl Vroo- 

 man. writing on his rambles in Switzerland, remarks 

 on the fact that the Swiss territory is as free from 

 beggars as Ireland fiom snakes. A friend on leaving 

 a Swiss village handed the pastor fifty francs for his 

 poor. The pastor replied, " We have no poor." He 

 expresses his surprise to find a prominent Socialist in 

 the Chair of Political Economy m Geneva University. 

 He applauds the system by which in sixty years from 

 date of purchase the Swiss railways will be the pro- 

 perty of the people, free and unencumbered. The rest 

 of the papers are live and propulsive, 



THE FORTNIGHTLY REVIEW. 



Beyond Victor Marsden's practical considerations 

 concerning the Anglo-Rpssian entente, Mr. Gribble's 

 study of John Stuart Mill, and Mr. Russell's paper on 

 " Ritualists and the Royal Commission," there are no 

 articles of exceptional eminence in the August 

 number. 



TO EXTEXD THE COUNTY COTTBT. 



Judge Parry writes on the future of the County 

 Court. Himself sympatliising with Lord Brougham's 

 faith in free law, he contents himself with suggesting 

 certain reforms in the Count.v Court. He would 

 abolish imprisonment for debt for a sum less tlian 

 ■10s. It would injure no one, he says, but traders 

 who deliberately give credit to the working classes, 

 with sanction of imprisonment for debt. He would 

 let the Post Office work a great deal of the pure debt- 

 collecting business in connection with the County 

 Court. He would increase the jurisdiction from £100 

 to £jCO. He would use the registrars for cases deal- 

 ing with £.5 or £10. He would extend the County 

 Courts in the shape of District Courts or branches of 

 the High Court. He maintains that the County 

 Court is the only growing and popular tribunal fa- 

 voured by the business man of the counti-y 



A TILT AG.\INST MUNICIPAL TRADING. 



Mr. John Holt Schooling takes up again his pole- 

 mic against the conduct of our local finance. Until 

 the war period, he says that local expenditure wa-s 

 ra.pidiv training on national expenditure. Of 1060 

 municipal productive concerns, with a capital of 121 

 million pounds, he finds that the net profit works out 

 at the late of 6s. 3d. per £100 per annum : that the 

 amount set aside for depreciation is 3s. 2d. yearly 

 per £100, which is, he says, grotesquely inadequate. 

 Wei-e 5 per cent, written off for depreciation, there 

 would be an average yearly loss of 5^ millions. Five 

 hundred and ninety-three of the 1060 are worked at 

 a confessed loss: -167 at an alleged profit. The local 

 spending authorities are, he maintains, incompetent 

 and untrustworthy stewards. 



IS BELGIUM SATE? 



A writer signing himself " Y " inquires how far 

 Belgium is ready to justify our guarantee of her ter- 

 ritory. He says. " Both iii France and Belgium it is 

 held that, in view of the military advantages to be 

 derived from it, Germany will not hesitate to violate 

 the neutralitv of Belgium on the outbreak of war." 

 The twenty-one forts around Liege and Namur are 



allowed to be formidable and strong, admirably con- 

 structed and well-equipped ; but is the Belgian army 

 equal to the task of defence? He suggests that the 

 war strength of Belgium should be increased to 

 200,000 men. He hopes that the British Govern- 

 ment, with a view to maintaining greater cordiality 

 between the two peoples, will not be too hard on 

 Belgium for its Congo administration. His own hope 

 is the military co-operation of Holland and Belgium. 



THE HIGHEE TEACHING OF WORKING MEN. 

 Mr. J. A. R. Marriott, in reckoning the influences 

 that make for the higher education of working men, 

 gives first place to the co-operative movement, and 

 seccjid place to Ruskin College, which provides a 

 training in subjects which are essential for working- 

 class leaderships, but are not direct avenues to any- 

 thing beyond it. He also mentions the Workers' 

 Educational Association, founded three years ago, 

 and now counting 280 societies and 2-500 members, the 

 aim of which is to co-ordinate existing, and devise 

 flesh means to raise working people of all degrees of 

 education. He describes as grotesquely exaggerated 

 the statement that the University Extension move- 

 ment has failed amongst the working-clas.ses. 



OTHER ARTICLES. 

 Mr. W. S. Lilly offers an interesting, if not very 

 profound, comparison between Kant and tne Buddha, 

 pointing out the resemblances and differences. Per- 

 haps Mr. Lilly might find a greater similarit.v be- 

 tween Fichte and Buddha. Miss D. G. McChesney 

 treats of Dora Greenwell. She finds in all her poems 

 a strangely-blended passion of protest and affirmation, 

 of revolt and acceptance. Most at home in the mys- 

 tical sphere, she could respond also to the heroic note. 

 Mr. M. Grothwohl, finding that Pierre Corneille's. 

 betrothal and marriage entirely interrupted the flow 

 of his amorous poetiy, suggests the hypothesis that 

 the dramatist was in love with his sister-in-law. Sir 

 Oliver Lodge curtly disposes of Mr. Mallock's critique 

 ill a previous number; he regrets to say that he fails 

 to find in it criticism ; he perceives nothing to which 

 he can usefully and briefly reply. 



UNITED SERVICE MAGAZINE. 



The first place is given to an emphatic protest 

 against any thought of reducng our naval prepara- 

 tions. Taking only the first-cla.s^ battleships, the 

 writer maintains that we are barely uu to the two- 

 power standard. The United States' and Germany to- 

 gether make up a force of fifty-two ships, exactly 

 etpial to the number of ours. So far from any slack- 

 ening off in the matter of new construction and 

 strengthening of fleets, we would rather, so he urges, 

 seem to be entering on a period of greater rivalry than 

 ever. The wiiter closes with a gleam of liope by say- 

 ing that in the growth of German maritime trade he 

 is giving high hostages for peace, and would not be 

 likely to hazard them in single-handed conflict with 

 us. The question of abolishing grog in the Navy is 

 discu.s.sed, and the suggestion is made that it should 

 be given after supper, not after dinner, or if abolished 

 the men should receive Id. a day in place of it. Mr. 

 A. Keene defends the British soldier from certain dis- 

 paragements indulged in by Ian Hamilton. "Acorn" 

 pronounces the ''curse of cosmopolitair'sm " in a series 

 of sermonic epigrams. He relies on the old-fashioned 

 ideas of insularity and duty. Mr. Maguire gives an 

 account of the campaigns of Napoleon, with a map. 

 A piquant interest attaches to a translation from the 

 Ru.ssian Revue de Cercl' MiUtnlre on the general 

 causes of the Russian defeats. Tliey are summed up 

 in the sentence, "the theoretic and scientific education 

 of our officers is too superficial.'' 



