Hence the products of our basic industries cannot hope to enter that market in any large volume. In spite of all this, even in the year 1923 which followed the enactment of the tariff, and in which therefore our manufacturers had had the least time to adapt themselves to the new situation, we exported 60 million pounds of our own goods, and about 16 million pounds of entrepôt goods, a total of 76 million pounds, over the hostile barbed wire entanglements of the United States customs. And this is fairly typical of the existing situation.

The reason why we are able to continue this trade has been well pointed out in a recent report of the Department of Overseas Trade:

As the prosperity of the people advances, a constantly increasing number of consumers revolt against the mass product and develop a desire for novelty and quality, for something out of the ordinary run of articles, once luxuries, but now in common use by a large proportion of the population. It is principally in catering to this desire that imported manufactured merchandise can make appreciable headway.

. The reputation of British goods for quality and workmanship helps them to find a ready sale in the American market in spite of prices necessarily much above domestic prices-in spite, also, of strong competition from other European nations producing novelty and quality goods which, favoured by depreciated exchanges, have been able to procure a wide foothold. There are many products of British manufacture that stand alone for style and quality.

The fact is that the system of mass production, for which America is famous, is not consistent with the variety and the quality which the world, as it grows richer, demands more and more. With the diffusion of prosperity, throughout the industrial centres of the middle-west and of the south, very wealthy communities are growing up which will provide an ever wider scope for the quality products of Great Britain. Our latest official report states that "in the hinterland there are many prosperous cities whose possibilities as regards imported goods can hardly be exaggerated." Thus the tariff has as its corollary mass production, and mass production will never win the world. It was admirably suited to the war era which, let us hope, now lies behind us, but it will never win the commercial race. It is the quality of Great Britain, and not the quantity of America, which will hold economic sway.

The fifth adverse factor in question is, it will be remembered,

the mercantile marine now being organized by the United States. The history of the mercantile marine of America shows very singular fluctuations. On at least two occasions during the nineteenth century, American shipping bade fair to be dominant. The tonnage of American vessels grew from 346,000 tons in 1790 up to close on 1,000,000 tons in 1812, while the percentage of their foreign trade carried in American bottoms increased from 25 per cent. to 91 per cent. The shipbuilding industry prospered correspondingly, so that in fact the increase of their tonnage had no previous parallel in economic history. Another such outburst of activity occurred about the middle of the nineteenth century. But both were, from an historical point of view, of a temporary and spasmodic nature and soon died away.

The present effort to build up a vast mercantile marine, though much the most strenuous of them all, cannot be said to have reaped much success, in spite of its impressive appearance. By the close of 1927 the United States Government is declared to have incurred the gigantic loss of no less than £600,000,000 on this important venture. And this loss has every prospect of a rapid increase. Further demands for spending another £60,000,000 on the replacement of obsolete ships have been formulated, and the running of the whole fleet continues to be unprofitable, though it is represented that the trading losses are tending to diminish. These net annual losses are made good by special appropriations of Congress, though private owners are not slow to declare that the government should liquidate this huge fleet on whatever But the pride of the nation is concerned, and thus the voice of the industrial and business organizations is swamped in the feelings of other parties.

terms.

The President of the United States, in his recent message to Congress, previously referred to, offered some not too agreeable observations as regards the mercantile marine of America. He observed that the Shipping Board had too often yielded to pressure, in order to protect private interests rather than to serve the public welfare. This rather damaging criticism was followed by a declaration that public operation has not proved a success, since American exporters and importers were alike indifferent as to the use they made of American ships. The vessels still retained should be disposed of-so the President recommendedas rapidly as possible. But, in view of public opinion, this latter desire may probably remain in the category of pious opinions.

To compare the American figures of tonnage with those of Great Britain we have to deduct probably about 4,000,000 tons from the American figures, leaving that country with 6,900,000 tons of vessels to be considered as effective units against 19,200,000 British. This raises the British portion of the world fleet from 32.2 per cent., as it appears in Lloyd's Register, up to nearly 35 per cent. Lloyd's Register Book also points out that, if we go down to realities still further, by excluding vessels over twenty-five years old, under 5,000 tons gross, and all the miscellaneous herd of trawlers, tugs, tankers, etc., then the ocean-going fleet of the world amounts only to 24.8 million tons, of which Great Britain owns 9.3 million tons, or nearly 38 per cent. We may reasonably raise this to 40 per cent. by excluding the "scrap-heap" tonnage of America. Thus the Red Ensign seems to hold its own.

Sir Herbert Hambling, speaking at the close of 1927, very justly pointed out :—

You will realise that this country is building 50 per cent. of the world's shipping. It is true that the percentage was higher still in pre-war years, but I have no hesitation in saying that when, in the face of keen competition, our country is entrusted with the building of half of the world's tonnage-work involving the highest degree of skillthere can be little justification for any suggestion that we are "down and out," and that our craftsmen are no longer 100 per cent. efficient. I think we may rest assured that, if any other country occupied a similar position in the ship-building world, she would proclaim the fact far and wide as evidence of her wonderful efficiency, and up-to-date methods, and we should hear little from her of self-depreciation.

This may be confirmed by mentioning that in 1927 the output of shipping in Great Britain and Ireland was 53.6 per cent. of the world's output.

GEORGE PEEL

RECENTLY PUBLISHED BOOKS

LIFE AND LETTERS OF ADMIRAL CORNWALLIS. By G. Cornwallis-West. With a Foreword by Admiral of the Fleet, Earl Beatty, G.C.B., etc. Illustrated. Holden, 30s. net. "Billy Blue," as Admiral Sir William Cornwallis was affectionately known in the Navy, was a sailor of such outstanding merit that it would be curious that no full-dress "life" of him has appeared before this, if we were not told by Major Cornwallis-West that all the Admiral's correspondence has lain forgotten at his old home at Newlands Manor, until it was discovered in an attic a year or two ago. It is an unusually valuable piece of naval history which the author of this book has disinterred from this correspondence and other contemporary sources. Cornwallis, the colleague of Rodney and Hood, the friend and senior officer of Nelson, kept the seas against the French as well as any of these great admirals. What he chiefly lacked was luck. But for the fact that just before Trafalgar he failed with the Channel Fleet to make contact with Villeneuve, it seems highly probable that he would have become the national hero who finally defeated the French sea-power. That Nelson admired the great qualities of Cornwallis is shown by many letters reproduced in this volume; and the feeling seems to have been shared by most of the other admirals, except Lord St. Vincent, and in his case jealousy entered in. Not only was it the fate of Cornwallis generally to meet the enemy when he was at a disadvantage, but he was more than once the victim of discreditable political intrigues, and Pitt was his enemy. So he missed the great opportunities given to Nelson; but it is at least arguable that he served his country as greatly as Nelson. This volume is an admirable record of the man and his times.

LATTER DAY RURAL ENGLAND. By S. L. Bensusan. Benn, 8s. 6d. net.

This book is the fruit of a tour of agricultural England, undertaken by the author last year. It has the merit of containing detailed information on the conditions of farming in different parts of England as Mr. Bensusan found them, and of an admirably lucid style. Certain main propositions are established. The first is that the urban population will never permit Protection to enter the realm of practical politics; the second, that agriculture can thrive quite well without it, if only farmers will combine to help themselves instead of shouting at the top of their voices for State aid and for special advantages that are denied to the other industries that must struggle with them, side by side." With regard to the agricultural policies of the three political parties,

the author writes: "Though I am no longer in the Liberals' camp, I have been forced to the conclusion that there is more in their programme than there is in any other to satisfy the actual needs of the time."

Apart from the chapters in which the author discusses the practical problems, there are included various Interludes in which are reproduced conversations with various typical farmers, labourers--and the wives of both, "upon whom a great part of the burden falls from dawn to dusk for seven days in every week." As an independent and unbiassed investigation, Mr. Bensusan's book should rank in importance with Sir Rider Haggard's " Rural England " and Sir Daniel Hall's investigations in the three years just before the war.

GEORGE WASHINGTON : THE IMAGE AND THE MAN.
W. E. Woodward. Cape, 12s. 6d. net.

By

In breaking the image of Washington, Mr. Woodward has been daring; but he undoubtedly succeeds in giving his readers a much more likeable personality, and in many ways a greater man, than the coldly correct Washington of American tradition. Summing up the impression which he has gained during his researches, the author describes Washington as" the American common denominator." "His preoccupations were with material success. He was great in all ordinary qualities. . . . He was utterly honest; but his honesty was combined with shrewdIdeas had only a small part in his life. He did not consider them important, nor does the average American. He was thoroughly undemocratic . . . and this, too, is typically American. He was not a man of first-rate ability, but in many ways he was a great man . . . not only great, but very great." In effect, Mr. Woodward suggests the mentality of Washington was very much that of those Captains of Industry" so prominent in modern America.

ness.

THE DISCOVERY AND CONQUEST OF MEXICO (1517-1521). By Bernal Diaz del Castillo. Edited from the only exact copy of the original MS. (and published in Mexico) by Genaro Garcia. Translated with an Introduction and Notes by A. P. Maudslay, Honorary Professor of Archæology, National Museum, Mexico. With 15 Plates and Maps. (The Broadway Travellers.) Routledge, 15s. net.

Although references have been made by several historians of the Conquest of Mexico to the manuscript of Bernal Diaz, it was not until the late 'nineties that an official copy was allowed to be made of the original manuscript in the possession of the City of Guatemala. A translation in five volumes, by Mr. Maudslay, of the complete MS. of "The True Story of the Conquest of New Spain" was published by the Hakluyt Society in 1908, but the present volume is the first edition at a popular price of that part of the account which relates to Mexico. It is an extraordinarily vivid and illuminating story that Diaz has to