ent attempt of the publishers to conceal the fact that it is a translation.

A hundred pages are devoted to Proudhon, the "father of anarchism," the "proletarian in wooden sabots and blouse"; and a third as many to Casper Schmidt ("Max Stirner"), "that plain German schoolmaster who would people society with mere sons of Prometheus, while he himself totters starving to the grave." These are the founders and apostles of the doctrine. The author then gives account of the "modern anarchists"-Bakunin, "the commercial traveler of eternal revolution in a magnificent pose"; Netschajew, "the apostle and saint of Nihilist poesy"; Krapotkine, "the learned prince"; Elisée Reclus, "the earnest savant, full of the purest love and devotion for mankind," "the St. John of the anarchists"; Grave, "every inch the man of action"; Saurin; Louise Michel, "the caricature of the social revolutionist in petticoats"; the "repellant" Dühring; von Egidy, with his "spirit of Prussian militarism and squiredom"; John Henry Mackay, "honest and upright," and like Caliero a millionaire; Most, "fateful and gloomy"; and so on. The distinctions which many overlook are carefully drawn between philosophical anarchism and the "propaganda of action"; between the early, middle and later periods in the development of the doctrine; and between its individualistic, collectivist and communistic forms.

The author holds that the theory "contradicts human nature and the facts of life"; that even if put in practice it would be "very harmless-leaving everything as before, merely changing the present compulsory system into a voluntary one"; that its mission is to assist in the overthrow of socialism; and that it "cannot be conquered by force and injustice, but only by justice and freedom.”

It is a pity that so good a book should not be better. It swarms with typographical errors, specially in the spelling of German words. It gives the titles of works, now in the original, now in translation, as it may chance; and its critical and constructive portions are by no means equal to those which are historical and expository.

W. F. B.

The War of Greek Independence, 1821 to 1833. By W. Alison Phillips. With map. New York, Charles Scribner's Sons, 1897-12m0, pp. xv +428.

This volume is a convenient and readable account, making no claim to originality, of the Greek revolt and the establishment of the present kingdom. The author clearly tries to be impartial, and has gone to the best secondary sources, and to the primary sources for diplomatic questions. He does not, however, mention S. Trikoupis's History of the Greek Revolution, in modern Greek; so able a work from the Greek side, by an actor in the events described, cannot be overlooked without loss. Mr. Phillips is certainly not unduly Philhellenic; he dwells with rather more emphasis on the various Greek acts of savagery than on those of the Turks. Nevertheless, writing during the recent war, he points out clearly how unwise and unfortunate it was, for European interests as well as Greek, to make the young kingdom so small and weak by excluding from it Crete and the other Greek islands that Turkey still holds.

Yale University.

T. D. GOODELL.

The Bargain Theory of Wages. By John Davidson, M.A., D.Phil. New York, Putnam's, 1898-8vo, 319 pp.

This is an interesting book written in an easy and attractive style. It was planned as a text-book for advanced students, but serves equally well the purposes of the general reader. The author treats in succession the subsistence theory, the wages fund theory and the productivity-of-labor theory. He then tries to fit them, or such parts of them as can be fitted, into a "bargain theory." The Ricardian idea that wages were fixed at the level of subsistence looked only at the laborer's side of the bargain. The productivity theory looked only at the employer's side. The wages fund theory was the only one of the three primitive theories which treated of both the demand and supply of labor. But this theory was too simple and too crude. The "bargain theory" is in brief that the laborer has a lower limit by which he is prepared to stand and the employer an upper limit, and that wages are fixed between the two according to the relative strength of the two parties as bargainers.

In the preliminary chapters, commenting on the three original theories, the author follows the Baconian method with true scientific instinct. Facts are cited in favor of the subsistence theory, such as

that parish allowances decreased wages, charity becoming part pay to the laborer and relieving the employer of the necessity of the entire support of his workmen; and that city wages are higher than country. Facts against the theory are that agricultural wages are higher in summer than in winter, while cost of living is higher in winter than in summer. The aid of statistics is frequently invoked, especially in treating the subject of the mobility of labor. Many of the author's figures and illustrations are drawn from Canada.

The constructive part of the work is less valuable than the critical. As a discussion of the various concrete circumstances which strengthen or weaken the bargainers, it is admirable. Trade unions, knowledge, standard of living, custom, mobility of trade or country, are severally discussed. But, as it seems to us, we need to go much deeper than this to get anything which may truly be called a theory of wages. "Supply and demand" lie quite on the surface: we need to know the factors on which they depend and the mode of their dependence.

Even as an expression of the outcome of economic forces the author's statement of supply and demand is inadequate. An employer does not have a single upper limit; he has a sliding scale of limits, a "demand schedule" or curve. The same holds true of the laborer's side, the "supply." The nature of the laborer's schedule in particular needs investigation. The author points out that labor is a unique commodity, but he does not follow out its uniqueness. It is doubtless a fact that the supply of labor of many kinds increases with a decrease of wages. The less the laborer is paid the longer he must work to make a living, or the more inclined is he to put his wife and children on the labor market. This peculiarity of the "commodity labor" needed more attention than Professor Davidson has given it.

There is throughout the book a lack of that precision which we are graduallly requiring in economic treatises. In some cases crude confusions come to light. Those accustomed to regard capital as a stock at an instant of time and income as a flow through a period of time cannot pass, on the same page, from "wages . . are paid out of . . income rather than capital" (p. 56) to "the source of wages is the stock or the fund of such consumption goods" (ibid), or make sense out of "the income of society at any given moment, may be taken as an approximately fixed amount" (p. 63; the italics are ours). The author, like too many economists, appears to believe that mathematics do not apply

quite applicable, because we are dealing not with rigid quantities but with human forces" (p. 110).

Very probably the author had no intention of writing a final and rigorous treatise on wages. As a critical and historical essay his book is full of interest, instruction, and suggestion. I. F. Yale University.

Thirty Years of American Finance: a Short Financial History of the Government and People of the United States since the Civil War, 1865-1896. By Alexander Dana Noyes. New York and London, G. P. Putnam's Sons, 1898-8vo, xv, 277.

Many historians and economists would hesitate to write the financial history of the past thirty years. The immense difficulty of the task, in view of the variety of topics to be covered, their complicated inter-relation, and the vast amount of material to be collected, arranged and digested, has driven writers from the study of this to that of earlier periods. Mr. Noyes is the first to undertake the task, and has succeeded most admirably. In a clear and attractive way he introduces the general reader to the important financial events of the past thirty years. These are grouped about the general subject of currency debasement, and incidentally about the subject of surplus and deficit financiering. Mr. Noyes possesses in a high degree the necessary qualifications for recounting and analysing the varied financial experiences of the years since the Civil War. As Financial Editor of the New York Evening Post, he is trained to carefully follow and observe the daily movements of the various important markets, and to analyse their meaning, particularly in the money and in the exchange markets. To this excellent training he adds breadth of view and comprehensiveness of treatment.

There is a weird fascination in the story of the attempts at currency debasement since the war: the hopeful movement under Secretary McCulloch to contract the currency and its defeat as the result of the hard times of 1866 and 1867; the campaign of 1868, in which the Republicans were driven, as in 1896, by the attitude of the Democratic party to champion sound currency; their victory and the consequent passage of the Public Credit Act of 1869; the culmination of the inflation movement in 1873 and 1874, and the passage and veto by President Grant of the inflation bill of the latter year; the defeat of the Republicans in the Congressional elec

tion of 1874, and their consequent passage of the Resumption Act; the preparation for and carrying out of the resumption of specie payments; and at the same time, the adoption of a permanent paper money policy in 1878. Then the scene changes, and silver begins its rôle in the finances and politics of the country. From 1876 on, the inflationists change their allegiance from the greenback to the silver dollar. The latter is remonetized in 1878, and futile attempts are made to force it into circulation. Then follows a recital of the familiar story of our recent experience with the white metal: Secretary Windom's fantastic plan of 1889; the Sherman Act of 1890, its share in the upheaval of the following years, and its repeal three years later.

The question of the surplus revenue is taken up with the year 1885. This is a pity, for this treatment avoids the highly important revenue experiences immediately after the war, which have heretofore received too scant attention; moreover, opportunity is thereby lost to analyse the changes in our federal revenue system during the past generation, which are of importance in the recent difficulties, and will have their distinct bearing on future developments in our revenue system. The changes in our revenue system, in particular in our customs revenue, suggest the corresponding changes in our foreign trade and in our tariff legislation. The former might have been more fully treated, though the author is eminently successful in examining our and foreign crop statistics, our exports and their important bearing, for instance, on resumption in 1879 and on the difficulties since 1890. These latter experiences fill about half the volume, which goes into great details in analysing the deficit financiering of the past six years, the increase of Federal expenses and the decrease of revenue under the various tariff acts, the critical times of 1893, and the subsequent bond issues. These last are particularly well discussed by Mr. Noyes.

A few of the striking lines of thought in the book deserve particular notice. The criticism of the official acts of the two Secretaries of the Treasury, Mr. Sherman and Mr. Carlisle, are, on the whole, eminently just and fair. The lucky combination of abundant American with deficient foreign crops, which, on several occasions, has removed or at least postponed grave financial difficulties, is fully shown. Special attention is called to the government's policy of supplying the general demand for notes of small denominations with $1, $2 and $5 silver certificates. This movement, beginning in 1886, has completely changed the character of our circulating