THE MAGAZINES.

PROFESSOR VAIVIBItRY writes at length in the Nineteenth Century on "The Future of Constitutional Turkey." In his opening retrospect he gives an interesting reminiscouce of the first symptoms of the reform movement in the late "fifties," the idea of the conspirators being to force the Sultan to grant a Constitution on the grounds that absolutism as hitherto practised was contrary to the spirit of the Koran, and that the Caliph, as representative of the Prophet, could not be allowed to commit such a sin. This view of Islam Professor Vambory endorses : " Islam is known and famed as being an ultra-democratic religion, and it is only the tyranny and the excessive egotism of the absolute rulers of the Moslem East which have hitherto acted as brakes." At the same time, he readily admits that the removal of despotic power by no means ensures the smooth working of the new Constitution. The work of regeneration in Turkey is fraught with enormous difficulties, amongst which he specially notices four : (1) finance; (2) the social transforma- tion, involving an acute conflict over the relation of the sexes and the harem laws; (3) the problem of education, which cannot be solved without the simplification of the language; (4) the obstacles placed in the way of political administration by ethnical and religious differences. But, on the whole, Professor Vambery maintains an optimistic outlook. As long as the repatriated exiles and the patriots at home work harmoniously together, there is no danger in store for Turkey. But the Powers must show patience, indulgence, and forbearance, and abstain from extravagant expectations. These are large reservations, and the fall of Kiamil has already inspired the writer with a certain amount of misgiving.

—Lieutenant-Colonel C. F. Massy, formerly Commissioner in the Punjab, in a paper on " India Revisited " records his impressions of the present situation and his opinions of the projected reforms. Of all writers on the subject outside the ranks of avowed Nationalists, Lieutenant-Colonel Massy is perhaps the most optimistic. He is convinced that neither Sepoy nor peasant has been "got at" by the irreconcilables on any scale worth discussing. The area of discontent he holds to be limited, and he finds no traces of organised conspiracy. The attitude of the Feudatory States is one of absolute

loyalty. Nevertheless, he asserts that the concessions pro- posed in Lord Morley's reforms have come none too soon, and regards them only in the light of an instalment. " We

must look forward before long to a generous sharing with Indians of the higher posts now monopolised by members of the Civil Service," as well as the higher appointments in the Medical, Education, Public Works, Forests, Railways, Customs, Surveys, Post and Telegraph Departments, "always, of course, on condition that good men and true are to be found for the posts." In conclusion, lie expresses a strong opinion that the recent measures of repression will deal a death-blow to open agitation if only they are freely and swiftly resorted to. " The propagandists of assassination are in no way countenanced or supported by the vast majority of the Nationalists, whose aims are defeated by violent measures, calculated only to estrange from them the sympathies of many Englishmen who are quite prepared to give to Indians fitted for it a fair share in the government of their own country." The reserves and admissions in Lieutenant-Colonel Massy'e artiolo—e.g., that agitation pays, and that we are cordially bated by one half of the younger educated men— render some of his conclusions difficult to accept, and it is curious to find a writer who simultaneously goes beyond Lord Morley both on the side of concession and repression.

Senator Pulsford, one of the ablest and most energetic advocates of Free-trade in Australia, contributes a striking comparative study of the two principal Australian States, Victoria and New South Wales, under rival fiscal policies,

from 1866 to 1901. Tested by population, the number of workmen employed, value of machinery, public revenues, imports and exports, the restrictive policy adopted by Victoria is shown to have signally failed throughout. Senator Pulsford's last words are worth quoting :— " It may well be asked : 'If the policy signally failed in the one State of Victoria, why was it adopted by federated Australia in 1901 ? ' It can only be said that the world's history and all political life are full of instances in which the lessons of experi- ence have been disregarded. The State of New South Wales sent a big majority of free traders to the Federal Parliament, but the restrictionists of Australia were able to command a sufficient vote in the House of Representatives and the Senate to control the tariff."

Mary Eleanor FitzGerald-Kerrich contributes a pleasant personal reminiscence of her grand-uncle, Edward FitzGerald. A propos of his present popularity, she acutely remarks :—" I take leave to doubt, ungracious though that may seem to an appreciative public, whether be would have wished for or liked it. Cheap indiscriminate admiration be gave to neither person nor thing : it was his abhorrence. Would he

Lave welcomed it lavished on himself, so little understood when living ; on his work, possibly so little understood now P " —Mr. St. Clair Baddeley makes out a strong case for regarding the sunken galleys in the Lake of Nemi to have been built by Caligula in connexion with the cult and festival of Virbius. The account of the diving operations in 1895, witnessed by the writer, is truly thrilling, and inspires a strong hope that a more determined attempt may yet be made to bring these unique treasures to land.

The chronic discontent of the Tariff Reform extremists with "Mandarins," Whips, and leaders is once more picturesquely expressed in the National Review. " Old Parliamentary Hand" insists in the March issue on the need which is incumbent on all good Unionists to put their house in order,—i.e., to jettison not only ex-Ministers, but the broken remnant who survived the debacle of 1906, "a singular survival of the inarticulate and

indifferent." With engaging candour he declares that " Tariff Reformers are in deadly earnest, and are determined to reap the reward of their successful propaganda, and will not permit the cause they have at heart to be sacrificed to ex-Ministerial susceptibilities, or by ex-Ministerial friendships." If the

-" spoils " principle is logically carried out, we may look

forward to a Cabinet of Confederates, whose methods the editor once more blesses in his editorial notes,—where, by the way, he describes Lord Robert Cecil as a man

"determined through insular prejudice to preserve, wit' te que mite, our present rotten bankrupt fiscal position."— " Strategist" gives a long and interesting account of the progress of the great Rhine-Hanover Canal, the cost of which is estimated at £12,500,000. According to the writer, no one can study the history of this enterprise without being struck by "the almost passionate persistence of thePrussinn Govern- ment in pursuing this canal project, and the personal part taken, to the verge of his constitutional rights or beyond it, by the German Emperor in his role of King of Prussia." The explanation of this attitude is found by the writer in the military and strategic advantages of the scheme :- "If ever the Germans cross the narrow seas to our eastern coast, it will not be on North German Lloyd ocean liners. They have a transport in being, now solely engaged in the purposes of civil life,' which is infinitedy more suitable to that purpose. When steam-drawn 600-ton barges can pass from the Rhine to the Ems and the Weser, still more when they can pass to the Elbe, or from the Elbe to the Weser and the Ems, tho Germans will have at their disposal, if fate should decree a war, such an instrument for invasion as never yet threatened the shores of heedless Albion."

—Major Badon-Powell propounds a " momentous problem for legislators " in his ingenious and suggestive paper on " Law in the Air." Proceeding on the assumption that in four years' time flying will have become common, he outlines a number of questions which will then demand settlement,-

e.g., the rule of the road in the air ; the relation of aerial navigators to international frontiers and private bOundaries.

Finally, Major Baden-Powell notes that we shall soon have to decide between the claims of the Board of Trade and the Home Office to be the responsible authority for the registra- tion and policing of aerial traffic, unless a now Air Board is specially created.—Dr. William Barry takes Mr. Graham Wallas's Human Nature in Politics as the text for a brilliant and eloquent plea on behalf of the fusion of Christianity and democracy :- "Democracy is not yet established ; Christianity has been thrown out of the public order, thanks to the crimes and follies of its own adherents, often in highest place. How if these two movements, so alike in their aspirations, wore to join forces P 'rho Fatherhood of God is the sole ground of hope in tho future brotherhood of man. Unless there be this primal fount of pity in the nature of things (to which all voting and laws derived from ballot-boxes must conform) we have no assurance that democracy is possible. In the clash of blind energies it may be simply the manner of the universal or world-suicide which Schopenhauer foresaw—the disintegration to atoms of an ordered life run wild. But granting the faith of Christendom we may work towards it confidently. Then justice and peace will embrace on some happy day when mankind discovers, in its likeness to the Supreme, its essential oneness through all its tribes. At the present hour Christians feel that democracy is without consecra- tion; democrats answer that the old religion sanctifies injustice. Yet these are but the Rival Brothers of the Greek tragedy. Will they unite to raise and govern the City of Man, which owns Christ for its king? Or will they fight to a finish, and on the pyre which one has kindled for the other, will that which we call civilisation go up in flame P" —Mr. Carlyon Bellaire, M.P., maintains that " au actual war crisis in 1912 can only be prevented by a political crisis concerning our shipbuilding programme to-day" :—

"It is officially admitted that Germany will than have 13

• Dreadnought' era ships to our 12. To those we have to add our 1909 programme, and, if we include our two Lord Nelsons,' we have also to consider six American 'Dreadnoughts,' and six Vermonts' which are fully the equals, ship for ship, of our ' Lord Nelsons.' I adhere to the opinion I expressed again and again last year that no programme can be considered satisfactory that does not provide for six largo armoured ships, six cruisers, and 24 destroyers, and has in view the repetition of this pro- gramme for several years in succession."

—We may also notice a most informing article by Miss Helen Zimmern on counterfeit works of art, and Miss Fell

Smith's study of John Doe, the famous Elizabethan astrologer.

The Contemporary _Review gives prominence to a paper on

" Ministers and their Critics," by Mr. E. T. Cook. Like everything that proceeds from his pen, this article is void of

partisan animosity, and is by no means an unqualified eulogy of the present Administration. Indeed, he frankly admits that, assuming the sincerity of their deals() to make the veto of the House of Lords the dominating issue, they let slip the psychological moment for pressing the Campbell-Bannerman

Resolutions,—after the rejection of the first Education Bill. Nevertheless, he contends that, having decided to let the more favourable opportunity pass, Ministers are wise to reject all less favourable opportunities and to bide their time. He admits, again, that they are involved by this action in a certain• dialectical difficulty. "If they can do nothing, why do they continue to plough the sands? If their furrows are fruitful, why do they say that the House of Lords reduces them to impotence P " The answer to this dilemma, according to Mr.

Cook, is that each proposition as stated by the dilemma, makers is partly true and partly false. He gives two reasons why the Government is bound to go on, and why such con- tinuance gives the best chance of success when the time comes for an appeal to the country :—

" The first is the obvious necessity imposed upon Ministers to show how the increased expenditure required by the Navy and by social reform can be financed on Free Trade lines. To avoid this issue would be to shirk an obligation. The Tariff Reformers are ready with their plan, not indeed in detail, which they sedulously avoid, but in general principle. Regarded from the financial point of view, it is a scheme for raising the required revenue by a vast system of indirect taxation, which would, in some of its principal items, press with peculiar force upon the poorer tax- payers. The Liberal Government has to produce its alternative plan, and much will depend upon the impression which it creates.

The second reason why Ministers are well advised in continuing their work is the importance of placing before the country in full view their schemes for alleviating the problems of poverty and unemployment. Here, again, their opponents are ready with a remedy, utterly fallacious, as every Free Trader knows (and its fallacy is in part admitted by the more scrupulous of the Tariff Reformers themselves), but yet not devoid of speciousness. The task of the Government is to meet thin appeal, not merely by destructive criticism (continuous though that should be), but also by a constructive policy of their own."

In conclusion, Mr. Cook declares that those who are in earnest about the House of Lords must keep the leaders of the Liberal Party to the pledges given by Sir William Robson and Mr. Churchill,--pledges which involve "a willingness to subordinate every other consideration to the question of the House of Lords at the beginning of the next Liberal Parlia- ment, and to stand the racket of a second election ' close upon

the heels of the first.' " It will be interesting to see whether the genuineness of the movement will survive so drastic a test.—The Hon. G. K. Gokhale contributes a short paper on the "Constitutional Reforms in India." He admits that they mean a great step forward for the people of India, and that they make local self-government a reality. But his approbation is tempered by a significant reserve :—" It will be absolutely disastrous if any attempt is made to go back on the scheme in any important particular. The people of India have accepted it in the spirit in which it has been conceived by the Viceroy and the Secretary of State; and if they are now subjected to any disappoint- ment in connection with it there will be a violent reaction, which will be in every way deplorable." No mention is made of the dissatisfaction of the Mohammedans, the impression created by the paper being that the reforms are unanimously welcomed by the people of India.— " Eulenspiegel" writes an interesting paper on " The Young Generation in Germany." The gist of the article might be summed up in a single sentence. The young Germans are Anglomaniao in dress and sport and Anglophobe in politics. As for the feeling over the Boer War, the writer cannot admit that it has died away :— "Those Englishmen who, like the writer, were forced to live in Germany during the Boer war know better. The unceasing calumnies and insults uttered in public as in private against our countrymen caused pangs so bitter as, though forgiven, never to be forgotten. But even were this evidence lacking, there is left the telling testimony of the crisis of last November. What hurt the Germans most deeply of any part of the Deily Telegraph interview was the discovery that the Emperor had exerted him- self on behalf of the oppressors of a German stock, in the interests of that nation whom the German people had almost unanimously denounced as the enemy of mankind. That admis- sion has done more to estrange from the Kaiser the sympathies of his people than any other which the interview contains, and it is that which the Emperor will have the greatest difficulty in living down."

It would be wrong, however, to suppose that " Eulen- spiegel " wishes to belittle the Germans or to foster ill-feeling between the two nations. On the contrary, he generously admits their remarkable progress, and earnestly desires the promotion of a better understanding on the basis of know- ledge rather than sentiment. " If the young generation of England, with the two-Power standard as its mot d'ordre, would learn to know a little better the young generation of modern Germany, the mutual advantages accruing to the two nations therefrom would materially contribute to the peace of the world."—Mr. Charles Watney describes the methods of the three combatants in the tripartite struggle for Manchuria, and gives his reasons for backing the Chinese. In his view, China holds most of the cards: " a rich country capable of much return, a fairly able administration, a coins paratively well-to-do population with little'poverty and much intelligence, a very clever body of traders, a reorganised soldiery and some serviceable police, and finally general good:- will in her undertaking." China, he goes on to say, is not only helped by the popular hostility to the Japanese and the growing indifference to the Russians, but by the great fact that she has at last a clearly defined railway policy,—" the repurchase of every line now in foreign hands."

In the Fortnightly Review Mr. Atherley-Jones tells us that he was the only Liberal Member of Parliament who opposed what he calls the granting of an " extravagant privilegiumt" to the Trade-Unions. He asserts that the late Attorney- General, Sir J. Lawson Walton, shared his views, but said nothing, as he wished to remain in the Ministry. Mt4. Atbarley-Jones would evidently be glad if the House of Lords should uphold the judgment of the Court of Appeal in the case of the application of Trade-Union bands to the pay- ment of Members of Parliament. He sees the impossibility ok the recipient of maintenance being an independent repre- sentative. But the working man cannot give his services for nothing, and yet the writer does not seem to favour the State payment of Members.—Dr. Rappoport gives us a general view of the Russian police system, a system which appears to contain not one single redeeming feature. To increase the numbers of the police the pay has been reduced, with the natural consequence of a universal practice of black.- mail, the tribute levied on the Jews alone amounting to millions of roubles yearly. Autocracy, to bolster up its rotten system, devotes its energies entirely to the detection of political offences. The ordinary criminal is left alone, the obsession of authority being the bunting down of those holding Liberal ideas. To this end agents-provocateurs have been recklessly used, with the result that they have become the masters, and, when the revolutionaries are not plotting, take a hand themselves, there being strong reason to believe that M. Plehve and the Grand Duke Sergius were their victims. With such a system only anarchy is possible.—We are given the first part of a discourse by Tolstoy on " The Law of Force and the Law of Love." That force is always wrong is held to be the essence of Christianity. Especially is this so with military service. By taking one side of the question and dealing only with the oppressions of force it is not difficult to make out a case. The author most scrupulously avoids ever considering whether it is right to stand by with arms folded watching the strong oppressing the weak and innocent. Ind, dentally in this paper a scene at a Court-Martial is described with that extraordinary vividness and simplicity which we associate with primitive art.—Captain Swinton, L.C.C., makes a very interesting suggestion in his article, " A Garden Road." He would construct a road from north to south through the centre of England, with branches. To carry out his plan he proposes to acquire a strip of land about three hundred yards wide. Thus there would be room for a road, and for any further developments of locomotion. The road would be made so as to avoid big towns and thickly populated areas, though of course it would be connected with them by the old highways. The object

would be to drain people away from congested centres and spread them over the country, which would be made accessible by the new road, along which electric power could be dis- tributed for manufactures. The strip of land on either aide could be used for gardens, allotments, and small holdings, thus recouping some of the initial outlay. As to the labour required in making the road, Captain Swinton proposes to proceed slowly after the whole plan has been laid out, using unemployed men wherever possible. There is no doubt that

the problem of the road is one which is imminent. The railway will no longer be the sole distributing agency. Good roads are one of the antidotes to overorowded cities.

Mr. Edmund Candler tells us in Blackwood that his desire

to gauge the spirituality of India led him to study the Jain sect in particular. These are the people who are so careful not to take life that they abhor agriculture, and even go to the length of wearing a mask over their mouths lest an insect should enter and perish. Mr. Candler, bent on his inquiry, . went to Mount Abu, and admired the wonderful temples loaded with sculptured decoration. Here be saw, as he says, Europe through Jain spectacles, for in one shrine was a wall-painting in which an Englishman is represented, cigar in mouth and . gun in hand, walking down a street of ugly European houses. A naked Bbil with a, bow and arrow went before, and two • truculent-looking policemen with swords followed. "I saw my race as it appeared to the artist—proud, cruel, insolent, overbearing ; no more sensitive to bloodguiltiness than the • aboriginal Bhil." Afterwards Mr. Candler speculates on the end of all this absorption in cosmic things, and finds that it paves the way for

" the children of indolence who spread like locusts over India, living upon the substance of the poor. In a land where apathy and superstition are bred in the bone of the people it is strange that there are not more of them ; for to renounce the world is to be independent, honoured, fed, exempt from work and responsi- bility, secure from oppression, answerable to no man. Their spirituality seems to me the dead fruit of instincts whose vigour long since departed."

—The Warden of Wadham writes a panegyric of the Oxford undergraduate, though he hints at a certain absorp-

tion in athletics. He says, however, that getting into debt through extravagant living is far less common than it used to be. Politics, it seems, are greatly to the fore, and we are told that Oxford is as full of political clubs as was Paris in 1789. Socialism is also very attractive to the young and ardent. The writer has not taken the advice about verifying quotations, for he quotes inaccurately both Shakespeare and Kipling.—Sir Henry Braokenbury's "Memoirs " are hardly so interesting this month on account of breaks in the narrative, owing to the writer's career having taken him rapidly to many spheres of action, including Ashanti, Zululand, and India. In India Sir Henry came under the spell of Lord Lytton, who seems to have been capable of inspiring devotion to a very remarkable extent.

The English Review provides its readers this month with a mild sensation. It would seem as if the methods of advertising described in Tony-Bungay had inspired those responsible for the conduct of the magazine. So we have an • announcement printed in red letters stuck on to the blue cover of the review telling us that inside will be found "a censored article." Of course one hastens to see what this can be, and finds the article in question with tantalising spaces of

black where names should be. Unfortunately for romance, the mystery is explained in an editorial footnote, and we find that all this paraphernalia of Russian censorship has been merely assumed as an escape from the law of libel. The blacking-out has been done by the editors themselves I They tell us that they believe the charges brought by Mr. Belloo in his article against "certain public parsons," whose names are smothered in printer's ink ; but they add that "in this country the Law of Libel aids that very obscuring of facts to which Mr. Belloe refers." We now turn to the charges brought by the writer, and what do we discover P First, a

few vague and hypothetical cases of information kept out of the newspapers for reasons of State. When we come to the concrete instances, the chief one turns out to be nothing more startling than the accusation that English people were wilfully misled in the Press about the facts of the Dreyfus trial in the interest of the Jews. To arouse our sympathies Mr. Belloc must find objects more interesting than his friends Henri, Mercier, Esterhazy, and Company. After this we do not think his statement " that the Congo Reform business is a bit of cant and hypocrisy" will carry much weight,

The March number of the United Service Magazine contains a very amusing and well-written article entitled "Diplomacy, Strategy, and Tactics in the Year 1000 B.C." Its author, Lieutenant H. J. Pechell, has taken the story of Absalom's attempted coup d'etat, and the manner, diplomatic and strategic, in which David dealt with it, and has translated the

action into the language of modern policy and modern military science. No one who knows the thrilling story in the Bible narrative will fail to be deeply interested hi this essay. We hope the author may apply his method to some other of the battles • in the Bible and in ancient story.—Another interesting article is " Motor Mounted Infantry," which contains a series of suggestions in virtue of which motor-cars might be used to transport troops rapidly by road.—Perhaps, however, the most striking article in the March issue is "The Downfall of the Army Officer : a Subaltern's Reply." The article is a defence, and in our opinion as sound as it is able, of the ordinary regimental officer. The writer ends with six reasons why parents should encourage their boys to enter the Army. Its cheerful, healthy, manly tone does great credit to the author and to his professional colleagues, for we feel little doubt that it is typical, and represents the better opinion of the Army, in spite of the occasional growlings and grumblings of the Service.