s to Switzerland which
up to the time of its publication were quite inaccessible to American
readers.

"State and Federal Government of Switzerland." By John Martin Vincent,
Ph.D., librarian and instructor in the department of history and
politics, Johns Hopkins University. (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Press;
1891; 247 pages; $1.50.) Professor Vincent had access, at the
university, to the considerable collection of books and papers relating
to Switzerland made by Professor J.C. Bluntschli, an eminent Swiss
historian who died in 1881, and also to a large number of government
publications presented by the Swiss Federal Council to the university
library.

"The Swiss Republic." By Boyd Winchester, late United States Minister at
Berne. (Philadelphia: J.B. Lippincott & Co.; 1891; 487 pages; $1.50.)
Mr. Winchester was stationed four years at Berne, and hence had better
opportunity than Professor Vincent or Professor Moses for obtaining a
thorough acquaintance with Switzerland. Much of his book is taken up
with descriptive writing, all good.

Were I asked which of these four works affords the fullest information
as to new Switzerland and new Swiss political methods, I should be
obliged to refer the inquirer to his own needs. Professor Moses's is
best for one applying himself to law and constitutional history.
Professor Vincent's is richest in systematized details and statistics,
especially such as relate to the Referendum and taxation; and in it also
is a bibliography of Swiss politics and history. For the general reader,
desiring description of the country, stirring democratic sentiment, and
an all-round view of the great little republic, Mr. Winchester's is
preferable.

In expanding and rearranging my "Times" and "Chautauquan" articles, I
have, to some extent, used these books.

Throughout this work, wherever possible, conservatives, rather than
myself, have been made to speak; hence quotations are frequent. The
first drafts of the chapters on Switzerland have been read by Swiss
radicals of different schools, and the final proofsheets have been
revised by a Swiss writer of repute living in New York; therefore
serious error is hardly probable. The one fault I myself have to find
with the work is its baldness of statement, rendered necessary by space
limits. I could, perhaps more easily, have prepared four or five hundred
pages instead of the one hundred and twenty. I leave it rather to the
reader to supply comparison and a