Page:Science vol. 5.djvu/172

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page needs to be proofread.

156

��tVoi„ v., No. '

��Much more is to he done, especially in sweep- ing away the distinction of real and pci'soual eetnte. in Torbidding the Belllement of land, and by establishing a cheap and compulsory registration of land-titles. There must also be a rex'ision of local taxation. Such changes must be gradual. The remedies for present evila arc not to be sought so expectantly in philanthropy as in the modification of laws and privileges. Other countries, as well as Eng- land, suffer fiom bad government, and oven the United States is not free from disastrous laws. When government goes beyond its proper func- tion, it makes itself responsible for failures, and engenders the belief, that, if man is unhappy, government has mado hitn so.

The condition of London is then briefly con- sidered, — 'the greatest nianufactnriug town in the world,' which levies an octroi duty on coal to an amount " which seems insignificant, but is siiltlcient to kill such manufactures as depend on its prodigal consumption." Bad aa the condition of London labor is. the author is persuaded that it is not so bad as was tbnt of all urban labor sixty years ago, and that the metropolis is not so ignorant or unclean as it was twenty years ago. The unrestricted recep- tion of foreigners is condemned. While ap- proving of charities in extraordinary cases, the author opposes compulsory and govern- mental charity on a general plan. "To adopt such an expedient would be to despair of the recuperative |X)wer of modern industry," and the relief of poverty would soon absorb all the products of labor, Heuiy George's plan for the nationalization of land is condemned; so is entail. Migration is commended. Small land-holdings are most desirable. The advan- t^es of trade-unions are pointed out with frankness and emphasis. Finally, the author, seeking for measures which will teud toward the just distribution of material comforts, takes courage for the future in the recollection, confirmed by careful historical studies, that England has taught mankind the m.icbinery of government, and that its free institutions, now spreading through the civilized world, depend upon enlightened public opinion. "The re- forms which have been efl'ecled are the work of the people, and they are to he traced in the stubborn |)erscverance with which Englishmen have criticised their own condition, and have discovered that from themselves only can the remedy bo found."

Before concluding this inndetjuate notice of a very important book, we may mention that the last eight chapters, comprising the modern facts, have been repriut«d by themselves for

��general circulation. We may also call atten- tion to an elalwrate treatise, well adapted to collateral study, on the subject of taxes and taxation in England, — four octavo volumes just given to the public by Stephen FowcU, assistant solicitor of inland

��This sketch of the physical geographj- and' geology of Canada has been prepared to ac- company a new geological map, preparei.1 by the geological survey, in two large sheets on a scale offorty miles to an inch. Both the m.ip and the sketch derive their materials from a rei-iew of all the topographical and geological work that has been accomplished in Canada, and give, in graphic and condensed form, a generi "

  • 'iew of the present stale of the physical explc

ration of the noi'thcru part of our continenl The physical geography is not treated with S much attention as it deserves: indeed, %b* pages of the sketch that arc devoted to this subject are more occupied with descriptive than with truly physical geography, and leave much to bo said. The geology is given more space, as is natural in the present stage of development of the two studies. Many of Its topics will probably continue to excite a oon- tTOversial interest in the future, aa Ihey hars in the p.tst; as, for example, the great St.^ Lawrence and Champlain fault, and its contin*; uation in a aeries of dislocations " traversii eastern North America from Alabama to Cl ada," as well as the relation of the formatioi on either side of it; the Lake-Superior co| per-bearing series, which Dr. Helwy as lower Cambrian; the subdivisions of the Ar- chaean, of which only two — the Laurentian and Iluronian — are recognized, and even these are not always clearly defined, while the so-called Norian is denied existence in Canada. Intrusive and eruptive masses of Arohae&n date are properly mentioned with emphasis, al- though they have " been singularly overlooked or ignored by most writers on American geol- ogy." Dr. Dawson's ' western section,' being a region of more recent exploration, has hardly yet reached the controversial stage. His de- scriptions of the several levels on the plains east of the mountains, and of the little that is known about the northward extension of our Cordilleras, are here presented in good fbrm

��I

��□d

�� ��* pAj/sicai iffogrnphy and

��' and Qfobtm q/

�� �