REVIEWS 599 protectionist conception. To humbly accept the results of experience as manifested in the course of exchange is the position of free-trade. That England has not a special but a comparative advantage over America in the production of iron as against wheat is proved for the free-trader by the export of English iron to America and of American wheat to England. That the law of comparative cost is the ruling condition of foreign trade is (though Professor Patten seems to think otherwise) as fully accepted by Jevons (Theory, p. 210) as by Ricardo. An appeal to the statistics of wheat-production in the two countries is plainly inconclusive, as no allowance is made for the greater care and larger capital employed in English agriculture. Both by the vigour and ingenuity of the arguments and the deductive cast of the reasonings employed, we have been often reminded of the plea for reciprocity contained in Torre?is's Budget, concisely charac. terized by Senior as 'eminently ingenious and eminently erroneous.' To apply that statement to the present work would be unjust, but without discourtesy we may express the opinion that Professor Patten's ability and wide economic knowledge have failed to establish the thesis that protection is beneficial either as a permanent or even as a temporary measure. a failure due to the inherent weakness of the cause, not to any defects on the part of its advocate. C. BASTABLE Transactions of the Political Eco?omy Circle of the National Liberal Club. Vol. I. London: King & Son, 1891. THIS first volume of the Transactions of the Political Economy Circle of the National Liberal Club cannot be termed quite satisfactory. Generally speaking the papers are too short for their subjects. The best are certainly Mr. Courtney's introductory address on the economic principles which should guide legislation with reference to the occupa- tion of land, Mr. Mann's paper on international migration, and Mr. Llewellyn Smith's paper on the migration of labour within our own country. Mr. Courtney deals in his address with the subject ?f occupation as distinct from ownership. Occupation involves the use of land, and the interest of the community with respect to occupation is that the best use should be made of the land. No occupier will make the best use of the land unless you guarantee to him, first, the immediate result of his labour, e.g. the crop which he has sown, and secondly, the replacement with profit of the capital which he has laid out in permanent improvements. Here, however, Mr. Courthey draws a distinction. The maker of a permanent improvement may have been fully recouped before the effect of the improvement has been exhausted; and then a question arises whether he is necessarily entitled to derive any further advantage from such improvement. But, again, the interest of the community requires that, among persons wishing to
