exactly as it has in turn been itself exceeded by our own time. On any theory of the State's functions, an increase in the number of laws and regulations was inevitable; it was only part and portion of the natural growth of things; but such an increase affords no evidence, not even a presumption, of any change in the principles by which legislation is governed, or in the purposes or functions for which the power of the State is habitually invoked. A mere growth of work is not a multiplication of functions; to get a result, we must first analyze the work done and discriminate this from that.

Now, in the first place, when compared with other nations England has been doing singularly little in the direction-the distinctively Socialistic direction-of multiplying State industries and enlarging the public property in the means of production. Municipalities, indeed, have widened their industrial domain considerably; it has become common for them to take into their own hands things like the gas and water supply of the community which would in any case be monopolies, and their management, being exposed to an extremely effective local opinion, is generally very advantageous. But while local authorities have done so much, the central Government has held back. Many new industries have come into being during the present reign, but we have national ized none of them except the telegraphs. We have added to the Post-Office the departments of the Savings Bank and the Parcels Post; we have, for purely military reasons, extended our national dockyards and arms factories since the Crimean war, but without thereby enhancing national confidence in Government management; we have, for diplomatic purposes, bought shares in the Suez Canal; we have undertaken a few small jobs of testing and stamping, such as the branding of herrings; but we are now the only European nation that has no State railway; we have refrained from nationalizing the telephones, though legally entitled to do so; and we very rarely give subventions to private enterprises. This is much less the effect of deliberate political conviction than the natural fruit of the character and circumstances of the people, of their pow

erful private resources and those habits of commercial association which M. Chevalier speaks of with so much friendly envy, complaining that his own countrymen could never be a great industrial nation because they had no taste for acquiring them. In the English colonies, where capital is more scarce, Government is required to do very much more; most of them have State railways, and some, New Zealand for instance, State insurance offices for fire and life. These colonial experiments will have great weight with the English public in settling the problem of Government management under a democracy, and if they prove successful will undoubtedly influence opinion at home to follow their example; but as things are at present there is no appearance of any great body of English opinion moving in that direction.

But while England has lagged behind other nations in this particular class of Government intervention, there is another class in which she has undoubtedly run far before them all. If we have not been multiplying State industries, we have been very active in extending and establishing popular rights, by means of new laws, new administrative regulations, or new systems of industrial police. In fact, the greater part of our recent social legislation has been of this order, and it is of that legislation M. de Laveleye is thinking when he says England is taking the lead of the nations in the career of State-Socialism; but that is nothing new; if we are in advance of other nations in establishing popular rights to-day, we have been in advance of them in that work for centuries already. That peculiarity also has its roots in our national history and character, and is no upstart fashion of the hour. Now, without raising the question whether the rights which our recent social legislation has seen fit to establish, are in all cases and respects rights that ought to have been established, it is sufficient for our present purpose to observe that at least this is obviously a very different class of intervention from the last, because if it does not belong to, it is certainly closely allied with, those primary duties which are everywhere included among the necessary functions of all government, the protection of the

cised by the Deliverer not only over the foreign affairs, to which his direction is generally thought to have been limited, but over all the domestic details of government which came before the Council. The contents of the letter books and petition books now to be calendared will go far to prove that William was his Home as well as his Foreign Secretary. Among the State Papers of this period possessing a special interest for the historian will be found the official letters of Lords Shrewsbury and Nottingham when Secretaries of State, the despatches of Viscount Sydney during his tenure of office as Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, the despatches of the Duke de Schomberg and the Earl of Marlborough, the correspondence of Sir Joseph Williamson as to the proceedings of the Treaty of Ryswick, the applications of the Admiralty and of the Secretary at War, and the ample memoranda, kept by the clerks of the Council, touching the current business at Whitehall. The work will consist of several volumes, as it is to contain all matter relating to the reign preserved in the Record Office.

WE understand that the whole of the second volume of the new edition of "Chambers's Encyclopædia" is now in type, and that it will be duly published (in accordance with the original announcement) by the middle of September. It covers the space from BEC to CAT; and among the more important articles will be the following: Bechuanaland, by Sir Charles Warren; Beethoven, by Sir George Grove; Berkeley, by Professor A. C. Fraser ; Bewick, Blake, and Botticelli, by Mr. J. M. Gray; Bible, by Professor A. B. David. son; Bimetallism, by Professor J. S. Nicholson; Biology and Botany, by Mr. Patrick Geddes; Bismarck, by Mr. Charles Lowe ; Boiler, by Professor A. B. W. Kennedy; Bookbinding, by Mr. Joseph Cundall; George Borrow, by Mr. F. H. Groome; Bowlder Clay and Carboniferous System, by Professor James Geikie; Breviary, by the Marquis of Bute; British Museum, by Mr. A. W. Pollard ; Broads of Norfolk, by Mr. Walter Rye; Browning, by M. G. Barnett Smith; Bunyan, by the Rev. John Brown; Burma, by Sir Charles Bernard; Burns, by Mr. Andrew Lang; Samuel Butler, by Mr. A. H. Bullen; Byron, by Mr. G. Saintsbury; Cairo, by Mr. Stanley Lane-Poole; Canal, by Professor Vernon Harcourt; Canon Law, by the Rev. Dr. R. F. Littledale; Cape Colony, by the Rev. John Mackenzie; Carlyle, by Mr. W. Wallace ;

Cashmere, by Major Holdich; Caspian Sea, by Prince Krapotkine, etc.

STEPNIAK has almost completed a novel-his first-which is to be called "The Enthusiasts." The book, which opens at Geneva, is, of course, a study of revolutionary character, and a picture of revolutionary incident and adventure.

THE Academy has the following charming little sonnet, which we are tempted to reprint:

TO A NIGHTINGALE.

"Forse a memoria de' suoi primi guai."-Purg. Sad bird, when thou dost flood the listening night

With liquid music from thy bursting heart, Within some tangled thicket out of sight

Of moon and stars, till saddened they depart And leave the world unlit, does thy quick brain Teem with the dim remembrance of the past? Dost thou forget thy bird-shape, and again

Put on that other self that once thou wast? Does the deep love that erst attuned thine eyes Now pour itself in music to the skies? Lone bird, would thou could'st know how thou hast wrought

My laden soul to sympathy with thine! Would thou could'st know, and gladden with the thought,

How, easing thy full heart, thou easest mine! PAGET TOYNbee.

THE recent death is announced of A. Larsen, a Norwegian resident in Copenhagen, author of several excellent dictionaries, in particular of the well-known Danish-English "Ordbog " which bears his name, and a new edition of which appeared last April. He is not to be confounded with a gentleman, also Mr. A. Larsen, who is widely known as the manager of the

greatest of Scandinavian publishing firms, the Gyldendalske Boghandel in Copenhagen.

MESSRS. SOTHEBY, of London, have recently sold a collection of books and Mss. brought together from different libraries, which offered many allurements to the bibliophile. Scattered through the catalogue there were, on the one hand, antique rarities-such as a very fine vellum copy of the Nuremberg Chronicle," Wynkyn de Worde's "Chronycle of Englonde" (of which only four other copies are said to be known), the "Great" or "Cromwell's Bible," several editions of both the "Bishops'" and the O Breeches Bible," the Elzevir "De Imitatione," and a "Sternhold and Hopkins" in a needlework binding embroidered by the sisters of Little Gidding; and, on the other hand, books of the present century which are scarcely less sought afterShelley's Laon and Cythna," and Keats's "Endymion," a "Tennyson" of 1833, be

IN consequence of a law passed at the last session of the Sobranje appropriating 60,000 francs for literary and scientific works, the Bulgarian Government has drawn up regulations for the study of literature and history. It is proposed to give a reward to all persons who bring to light ancient Mss. or literary documents of value, as well as those who send copies of popular songs, proverbs, riddles, etc., hitherto unpublished, or descriptions of usages and custom. These will be published in a collection edited by the minister of public instruction. Assistance will also be granted to the publication of literary and scientific works in Bulgarian, and of works written in foreign languages if intimately relating to the history and literature of the country. Another regulation provides that all antique objects discovered in Bulgaria belong to the state. It is forbidden to make excavations and searches for antiquities without official permission, on pain of confiscation of all objects found. There is the same penalty for attempting to export antiq uities without permission. If, however, antiquities are discovered accidentally, or after due permission obtained, their value is estimated; one third is given to the finder, and one third to the owner of the land on which they are found.

AMONG the promotions and nominations in the Legion of Honor, on the occasion of the national fête on July 14th, are the following: commander, M. Alexandre Dumas; officer, M. Sully-Prudhomme; chevaliers, M. Emile Zola and M. Louis Leger. It is noteworthy, as compared with an English "birthday gazette," that the name of no general, admiral, or civil servant appears on the list. All are connected with literature, art, science, education, or travel.

MISCELLANY.

A COMMON LODGING-HOUSE.-The room we are in is the kitchen," or common room, in which all the guests sit and take their meals, and amuse themselves until it is time to go

upstairs to bed. I cannot say how one of those kitchens would look in the glare of day. There is nothing to show sunbeams that they would be hospitably received, and so they remain outside. The light in these kitchens, then, is generally of the dim religious order. It suits the scene. The people who are sitting on the long forms at the tables, or crouching together before the dull red fire, would, some of them, look hideous in the full light of day. In the red glow that the fire throws on them as they sit in the darkened room they look almost picturesque. That swarthy fellow with the coal-black hair and the fierce eyes who sits on the floor, still working at his trade and

making baskets, might in this light have stepped

out of a Spanish picture. The woman, who, with a wretchedly dirty baby, sits on a form looking at him, is his wife. They are having a few words together as we enter the kitchen. They are tramps, and are only passing through London on their way to the south of England. The man had a cart and horse once; he did a broom and basket trade after the gypsy fashion. On a form drawn near the fire are three men of the hawker or street-trading profession. These men have sold out their wares, and won't go out again till early morning, when they will be off to the markets by four o'clock in order to get a bargain. They trade in different things according to the seasons of the year, ket-that is to say, in the stuff which is not but generally in the "scourings" of the margood enough for the shops, and even too bad for the costermonger with a connection Fish, oranges, watercress, nuts, onions, applesanything and everything that comes in their way at a price they will buy and sell. The workmen who live in these lodging-houses are not home yet. They will come in about six o'clock. There will not be many in this house because it is a low house-that is to say, it is a house frequented by tramps and loafers and shady customers, and moreover it is a "family house," and that means women and children to disturb the harmony of the evening in the common kitchen. The common lodging-house is to these men home and club combined, and the proprietor who gets this class of men-men in steady employment-tries to please them, and gradually they fill his house, and then he excludes chance customers and" roughs," and his house becomes a regular workingman's home. One great advantage that the man with regular wages finds in these places is that he is able to keep a valet. Yes, a valet! In all of these common lodging-houses there are men

who, for a copper or so a week, valet" for the aristocrats. For twopence a week paid to a poorer fellow-lodger, the aristocrat has his boots blacked and his supper cooked. In addition to this the valet runs his master's errands and keeps his favorite seat by the fire until he wants it, and when there is a discussion on any matter the faithful valet chimes in with his master, and is always ready to back him up in any assertion that he may choose to make. Besides workingmen and hawkers and tramps and mendicants, there is a class which frequents these common lodging-houses which can only be properly described as wreckage. It is among the wreckage that we find the " life drama" in its most painful aspect. "Wreckage" forms a large percentage in the sum total of London misery. Everywhere the men who have had their chance and flung it away jostle the men who have failed to grasp their chance, or who have had no chance at all; all classes meet in the common lodging-house, and the workhouse, and the crowded tenement-house, and there we shall find specimens of each, and learn their histories.-Cassell's Saturday Four

nal.

DICKENS ANECDOTES.-In 1857 Dickens became very unsettled and restless; he had, in the intervening years, confided to Mr. Forster much dissatisfaction-a constant want of something unattainable in his home. Then Dickens speaks of "unrest," of "being driven by irresistible might," and concludes with—“ [ find that the skeleton in my domestic closet is becoming a pretty big one." At last comes the crowning "confidential" letter-" Poor Catherine and I are not made for each other, and there is no help for it. It is not only that she makes me uneasy and unhappy, but that I make her so too-and much more so. She is exactly what you know in the way of being amiable and complying, but we are strangely ill-assorted for the bond there is between us. . . . If I were sick or disabled to-morrow, I know how sorry she would be, and how deeply grieved myself to think how we had lost each other. But exactly the same incompatibility would arise directly I was well again," etc., etc. In his rejoinder to Mr. Forster's reply Dickens says-" You are not so tolerant as perhaps you might be of the wayward and unsettled feeling which is part (I suppose) of the tenure on which one holds an imaginative life. . . . I claim no immunity from blame; there is plenty of fault on my side, I dare say, in the way of a thousand un

certainties, caprices and difficulties of disposition; but only one thing will alter all that, and that is, the end that alters all." One cannot read Mr. Forster's life of his friend without being impressed with the great lovableness of the character he depicts. No man on record had more friends or fewer enemies. He not only attracted and inspired the deepest affection, but he retained it. In every relation of life, save one, he seems to have been almost perfect. I did not again meet Dickens for many years, owing to my residing near Southampton, and also to the coolness that had arisen between him and my connections, who always remained friendly with his wife. Once I saw him at St. James' Theatre, where some amateur theatricals were going on for the benefit of some one, or some guild, I forget which. George Cruikshank acted Bombastes, and several celebrities took parts. Coming out of the theatre I was close to Dickens and Thackeray, and the way was blocked by a huge mountain of a man with a back like an insurmountable wall of flesh. I heard Dickens whisper to Thackeray with a chuckle—“ Can you explain whereabouts is situated the small of that man's back?" He turned his head, caught my eye, and threw me a comic, twinkling glance and smile, as he worked his way past the "manmountain." The last time I saw him was at a reading he gave, in Southampton, of the "Christmas Carol." It was splendidly read, indeed almost acted throughout; his voice and countenance were altered in accordance with each character most effectively. He was greatly changed-his face lined by deep furrows, hair grizzled and thinned, his expression careworn and clouded. The nostril was still sensitive and dilated like that of a war-horse, the whole aspect spoke of power, sensibility, and eager restlessness, but overcast with a shadow which blighted its geniality. The open, frank steadiness of eye was gone. He seemed to have withered and dwindled into a smaller man, and his former "flashy" style of dress had faded into shabbiness. The thickness of utterance was completely conquered by his long course of reading, acting and speaking, his declamation free from all hurry and indistinct

I.

STATE-SOCIALISM has been described by M. Leon Say as a German philosophy which was natural enough to a people with the political history and habits of the Germans, but which, in his opinion, was ill calculated to cross the French frontier, and was contrary to the very nature of the Anglo-Saxons. Sovereign and trader may be incompatible occupations, as Adam Smith asserts, but in Germany at least they have never seemed so. There, Governments have always been accustomed to enter very considerably into trade and manufactures, partly to provide the public revenue, partly to supply deficiencies of private enterprise, and partly, within more recent times, for reasons of a so-called "strategic" order, connected with the defence or consolidation of the new Empire. The German NEW SERIES.-VOL. XLVIII., No. 4

States possess, every one of them, more Crown lands and forests, in proportion to their size, than any other countries in Europe, some of them, indeed, being able to meet half their public expenditure from this source alone; and besides their territorial domain, most of them have an even more extensive industrial domain of State mines, or State breweries, or State banks, or State foundries, or State potteries, or State railways, and their rulers are still projecting fresh conquests in the same direction by means of brandy and tobacco monopolies. But in England things stand far otherwise. She has sold off most of her Crown lands, and is slowly parting with, rather than adding to, the remainder. She abolished State monopolies in the days of the Stuarts, as instruments cf political oppression, and she has abandoned State bounties more recently as

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