attention of the world, the product now equaling that of the whole country two decades past. Our railroads constitute an arterial system. They are natural and legitimate highways, connecting the most important sources of production with the great centres of trade, and they are so located and distributed as, for the most part, to exclude ruinous competition and to discourage paralleling. They have, through their main channels and feeders, built up and enriched their territories, and, latterly, well remunerated their operators.

Under these circumstances our financial condition has steadily improved and is improving. Wealth has been generally diffused, and has increased in the hands of individuals. Growing wealth and development have immensely stimulated enterprise, and more and more capital is wanted for legitimate ventures. Health and growth are manifest everywhere. Our chief desire is peace and non-interference from governmental sources.

The free coinage of silver has been and is now more or less a sensation, and to a certain degree has affected us as a bare future danger. Other causes are now, to some extent, quieting our investment market. But the gold-paying feature in securities is so far regarded and so far a recommendation as to prove that free coinage is an apprehension and a danger ahead. Yet there is not enough of this craze seriously to affect our finances. The people of the South have seen the miserable demoralization, distrust, gambling, and destruction of regular trade that comes of a debased currency. And it is easy to appreciate the great disadvantage that would come to our farmers, our manufacturers, and our merchants, but most of all to our wage-earners and salaried men, if they were paid for their products and hard labor in a currency that is itself liable to fluctuate in value and in purchasing power. American wealth, and skill, and labor cannot afford to be represented in foreign lands by a currency that has no dignity beyond its market value. A debased currency hastened the fall of the Confederacy. A currency that has never been surpassed has helped and insured a wonderful prosperity since the war. And we are not likely to exchange a blessing for what will be certainly a most dangerous experiment if not a delusive evil.

At this time it seems to me very plain that the securities and properties of the South rest on the strongest and surest foundations that finance can ask; that they are full of assured value and excellent promise. And I doubt whether anywhere else on earth so many elements and conditions combine to invite capital, and enterprise, and intelligence, and character.

The Southern States, out of utter ruin, have adjusted their debts and re-established their credit. Municipal loans are deservedly in high credit and favor. City debts are limited by charter to a safe percentage of their taxable property. Our railroad mortgages are small compared with the value of their property. And in very many cases stocks and income bonds represent a small capitalization of actual value.

Our State, municipal, and railroad bonds are to be had at low prices compared with the same class of securities elsewhere, and our income bonds and stocks are low and full of promise to those who have the wisdom to see their value and the nerve to act on their own judgments. Many of our stocks, dividend-earning and paying, are exceptionally low.

There is one event, daily growing nearer to its accomplishment, which will be of incalculable importance to the whole South. The completion of the Nicaragua isthmian canal promises to make a new and grander Mediterranean of our Caribbean Sea and Gulf; to make of Galveston, New Orleans, Mobile, and Tallahassee a Venice, a Genoa, a Florence, and a Marseilles, and to make the city of New York the settling point of the world. The effect of this great achievement will be to enrich the whole country and to make us one great people as nothing else can do.

RICHMOND, VA.

JOHN L. WILLIAMS.

BOOKS OF THE MONTH.

The Life and Times of John Dickinson (J. B. Lippincott Company), by Charles J. Stillé, worthily revives the memory of an early statesman, whose career was distinguished not only by great services to the colonies, but also by a robust independence. A leader in the opposition to the Stamp Act, and for some time after the enforcement of the Boston Port Bill, according to Bancroft, "controlling the counsels of the country," Dickinson did not hesitate to sacrifice his popularity and to incur wide-spread odium by resisting what seemed to him precipitate measures, like the signing of the Declaration of Independence. His "Vindication" of his course during the Revolution is a document of refreshing vigor. Indeed, the story of his life shows a personality so strong and sound that the patriotic Pennsylvanian must sigh as he closes the book and contrasts the weakness and flabbiness which characterize the Commonwealth's public men a century later." Ministers" is the first entry in a list of things required for the Massachusetts Bay Colony, which is preserved among the earliest records, and it is most fit that a series on the "Makers of America" should include the Life of Francis Higginson (Dodd, Mead & Co.), by his descendant Thomas Wentworth Higginson. The first minister in this colony, he lived little more than a year after his arrival, but his leadership was so marked that Cotton Mather placed his name at the head when he wrote the memoirs of more than thirty of the founders of New England. His "Description of the Commodities and Discommodities" of the region, written in 1630, in the quaint style of that day, is an extremely interesting feature of the book.The Life of Ferdinand Magellan (Dodd, Mead & Co.), by F. H. H. Guillemard, is the latest issue in the series of "The World's Great Explorers." It was high time that such a book should be written, for no biography of Magellan in the English language had ever been published. In truth, the first circumnavigator of the globe has not yet received from the world the recognition which his eminence in exploration should have assured him. Mr. Guillemard brings out well the sturdy qualities of the great Portuguese.

The Influence of Sea Power upon History, 1660-1783 (Little, Brown & Co.), by Captain A. T. Mahan of the United States Navy, is an attempt to fill an obvious gap in historical writing. There have been chroniclers of naval occurrences in plenty, but they have generally confined themselves to the events which they described. On the other hand most historians of nations and of periods have not been familiar with maritime affairs, and so were not likely to appreciate fully the influ

ence of naval victories and defeats. Captain Mahan has sought to show that the real bearing of sea power upon the course of history, from the opening of the sailing-ship era to the end of the Revolution, was far greater than is supposed. An enthusiast in any profession always runs great risk of exaggerating its actual share in the development of the world, but Captain Mahan makes out his case, and in a very interesting way. -The Old Navy and the New (J. B. Lippincott Company), by Rear Admiral Daniel Ammen, U. S. N., touches the same subject upon its personal rather than its philosophical side. It is essentially the story of his life by a veteran in the navy, who was appointed midshipman in 1836, by the same Congressman Hamer, by the way, who secured Grant a place at West Point. The boys were neighbors and playmates (Ammen saving Grant from being drowned at the age of seven), and they continued life-long friends. Ammen's principal purpose in these memoirs is to note the changes in naval architecture and armament during his career, and their effect upon naval life, and this he does in a gossipy style, which preserves not a few trifling incidents, but furnishes a great mass of really significant facts. An appendix contains a number of Grant's personal letters, written chiefly during his tour of the world, and bearing fresh witness to the deep interest which he shared with Ammen in the Nicaragua Canal project.

Ten Years in Equatoria and the Return with Emin Pasha (Frederick Warne & Co.), by Major Gaetano Casati, is the latest contribution to our fast-growing stock of information about Central Africa. Casati is an Italian who, after a creditable service of twenty years in the army, resigned in order to study geographical science and eagerly took an opportunity to join the ranks of explorers. His work adds some interesting facts to the world's knowledge of Equatoria, but its chief value consists in the light which it throws upon the curious character of Emin Pasha, with whom he was closely associated.As "the Dark Continent" is exposed to view, the curiosity of the world centers more and more about those polar regions which have not yet surrendered their mysteries. The First Crossing of Greenland (Longmans, Green & Co.), by Fridtjof Nansen, is the record of an Arctic trip which solved one of those mysteries, and proved that the interior is only one mass of unbroken ice. The distinctive feature of this expedition was its successful use of the “ski,” a Norwegian form of the ordinary snow-shoe which is a most extraordinary piece of foot-gear. The description of the Eskimo race is exceedingly interesting and valuable, done with a sympathetic touch which arouses also the reader's pity for what Nansen calls "a dying people, who, long since wounded by the venomous sting of external culture, are now perhaps past recovery."-The growing discussion as to closer relations with our northern neighbors has created a demand for such a book as Canada and the Canadian Question (Macmillan & Co.), by Goldwin Smith, which sketches the history of the country, outlines its constitution and considers the problem of its future. Professor Smith believes that "the primary forces" are work

ing toward a union with this nation, and that it is only a question of time when the crisis will arrive.—The Question of Copyright (G. P. Put‐ nam's Sons), compiled by Geo. Haven Putnam, brings together various sketches by several writers on the nature and origin of copyright, its development in England and the United States, the struggle for international copyright, and the bearing of existing laws on the interests of writers and their readers. Such a compilation is timely, and nobody is better qualified to elucidate the subject than Mr. Putnam,' whose connection with the long struggle for justice to authors has been most honorable.

Electricity (D. Appleton & Co.), by Emma Marie Caillard, professes to do no more than give an outline of modern electrical science, which can be understood by people who have never studied the subject and will never have the time for study, but who want to know enough about this wonderful subject to understand the principles of the electric lamp or the electric car. The expert is sure to pick an occasional flaw in such a book, but the untrained readers for whom it is prepared will find it trustworthy in all important points.

The Old Documents and the New Bible (James Pott & Co.), by J. Paterson Smyth, professes to be "an easy lesson for the people in Biblical criticism" and makes good the claim. Popular interest in all questions relating to the authenticity of the Scriptures was never before so keen as now, and this book is the first of a series intended to bring the results of modern study within the easy comprehension of the "plain people."-Hindoo Literature: or the Ancient Books of India (S. C. Griggs & Co.), by Elizabeth A. Reed, is an attempt to compress within a volume of 400 pages the chronology of these books, their place in the world's history, a résumé of their teachings and specimens of their literary style-in short, to furnish an intelligible idea of Hindoo literature in a condensed form.

Paris of To-day (Cassell Publishing Company), translated from the Danish of Richard Kaufmann by Miss Olga Flinch, proves to be the Paris of 1889; and as the illustrations are of that year's scenes, the women depicted inevitably lack that haut ton which is the chief characteristic of the Parisian woman. The illustrations, which abound throughout the book, range from the atrocious to the good, most of them having at least the merit of spirit. The text treats of the city and its people in all their phases-painters, writers and savants, actors and theaters, cabmen and nurses, street-scenes and night revelries, festivals and funerals, and the great exposition. The style is lively, and the book touches so many sides of the French capital that it is full of entertainment.

Woman's Work in America (Henry Holt & Co.), edited by Annie Nathan Meyer, contains eighteen essays by representative women on the achievements of the sex in various fields of labor. The editor sought to secure "a total absence of railing against the opposite sex," and the candid male reader must confess that men are here treated with far