The well-written introduction which Mr. Alvord has prefixed to his book comprises a careful survey of the history, and especially of the institutional development, of the Illinois country in the period covered by the accompanying documents. Drawn, as we are assured it has been, from unpublished and largely unused sources (the Kaskaskia Records, the Draper Manuscripts, etc.), it represents a real contribution to a subject which has too commonly been glossed over by writers for the obvious reason of lack of information. A useful bibliography is appended, though the principle on which it has been made up does. not appear. FREDERIC AUSTIN OGG.

Guide to the Materials for the History of the United States in Spanish Archives (Simancas, the Archivo Historico Nacional, and Seville). By Professor William R. Shepherd. (Washington, The Carnegie Institution, 1907, pp. 107.) This book, just published as we go to press, presents first an introduction on general archive-conditions in Spain, then describes in order the three principal repositories of material relating to the history of the United States. It states briefly the processes by which each collection was brought together and gives titles of the various printed and manuscript inventories. In each subdivision of each of the three sections, devoted respectively to the archives of Simancas, to the National Historical Archives at Madrid and to the archives of the Indies at Seville, a descriptive statement is given, followed by lists of the principal items relating to United States history which the compiler found. A brief general bibliography and a somewhat full index follow.

TEXT-BOOKS

History of Mediaeval and Modern Civilization to the End of the Seventeenth Century. By CHARLES SEIGNOBOS, Doctor of Letters of the University of Paris. Translation edited by JAMES ALTON JAMES, Ph.D., Professor of History, Northwestern University. (New York: Charles Scribner's Sons. 1907. Pp. xi, 438.)

The

WHAT are the features of this work? not dwell upon events. As the title implies it does It contains rather "selected topics of a nature to make the customs of each society clear, and explanations intended to make it understood how these customs were formed, modified and scattered". Many events are indeed briefly recalled, but only because of their special connection with the movement of civilization. larger lines of political development are indicated, and a résumé is given of the essentials of medieval and early modern history with reference to institutions, customs, ideas, art and letters. Barbarian Kings, The Church in the Middle Ages, Royal Authority in France, Struggle between the Houses of France and Austria, The Renaissance, International Relations-thus run

Government of the

some of the chapter

headings. Furthermore, the work was written-now some twenty years ago-to meet the requirements of the history programmes in certain branches of secondary education in France, enseignement spécial" and "enseignement des filles". So that what we have here is really a history of civilization under the yoke, though not the guise, of a text-book. Be it added that it is a text-book marked alike by high scholarship and by simple, clean-cut exposition.

What use may we reasonably expect to make of this work in our schools, now that it is accessible in English? It is not likely that we shall employ it as a text-book. Most of us think that an historical manual should set forth not the history of civilization as such, abstracted from general history, but the general story of men with emphasis upon their civilization. The French hold the same view, for the most part, and Professor Seignobos has lately written a series of manuals which exemplify it admirably. Probably the only sphere in which use of the work will be contemplated among us is that of collateral reading. Here, though, one encounters the practical purpose it was designed to serve. Being written to be a text-book, it must needs be brief and at the same time cover the whole field. Of necessity its treatments of most topics are very short, and of none very long. necessity, further, it adds relatively little to what is to be found in our better manuals, which make topics concerning civilization part and parcel of their account and dwell rather extensively upon the more important of them, like the Church in the Middle Ages and the Renaissance. Yet its matter is presented sometimes more truly than in our manuals and often much more effectively; and the translators have rendered, though not always with unswerving accuracy, on the whole with commendable success, both the sense and the style of the original. EARLE W. Dow.

Of

A Brief History of the United States. By JOHN BACH McMaster, Professor of American History in the University of Pennsylva(New York: American Book Company. 1907. Pp. 434,

nia. xxx.)

In this history of the United States for elementary schools, Professor McMaster has presented, as he says, "the essential features of our country's progress" and also "many things of secondary consequence which it is well for every young American to know".

The book shows a balance in the discussion of events that is noteworthy. Accounts of wars are reduced to a minimum. Western settlement and its influence are given an amount of space not heretofore seen in texts of this grade, and the leading features of industrial development are noted.

Of the forty-four chapters, the six most worthy of commendation are entitled: Our Country in 1789, Growth of the Country 1-89-1805,

Rise of the West, Growth of the Country from 1820 to 1840, State of the Country from 1840 to 1860 and Growth of the Country from 1860 to 1880. The presentation of such material for pupils of the grammar school age makes it probable that they will gain an incentive for further reading and study instead of rating history as a subject consisting merely of facts and dates which is straightway to be forgotten.

It is to be regretted that the author has in many instances so condensed the material in his paragraphs as to leave the discussion without life and certainly over-difficult for pupils who are expected to use the text. Eight lines are deemed adequate for an account of the First Continental Congress (p. 157). Four of them read: "met in Carpenter's Hall in Philadelphia in September, 1774, and issued a declaration of rights and grievances, a petition to the king, and addresses to the people of Great Britain, to the people of Canada, and to the people of the Colonies". The following description of the establishment of the judiciary also illustrates this tendency to over-compression (p. 222). "A Supreme Court was organized with a Chief Justice and five associates; three Circuits (one for each of the three groups of states, Eastern, Middle, and Southern) and thirteen District Courts (one for each state) were created, and provision was made for all the machinery of justice."

A special and praiseworthy feature of the book is the definiteness of the suggested readings. They are found in the foot-notes directly accompanying the subject-matter. But while in sympathy with this plan, the reviewer questions whether many of the leading references would not be more suitable to pupils of high school age. It is believed that only in the best schools where there are especially prepared teachers could grammar school pupils be expected to read with profit Rhode's History of the United States; King's and Pinckney's orations on the Missouri Compromise; and the speeches of Calhoun and Webster. Little supplementary biographical material is suggested other than that found in the numerous poems and novels cited.

Besides the twelve colored maps, four of which occupy double pages, there are forty-one well-executed maps of various sizes in black and white. They give all the essential information without being overcrowded with names. There is also an abundance of other well-selected material, chiefly photographs of articles found in museums and historical societies.

The single misleading statement is conspicuous (p. 42 n.); wherein the story of the saving of the life of John Smith by Pocahontas is given sanction as according to Smith's account". No doubt is raised as to the authenticity of the tale.

JAMES ALTON JAMES.

COMMUNICATION

The Mecklenburg Declaration: What Did the Governor See?

[THE following communication has been received from Dr. George W. Graham of Charlotte, North Carolina, and is inserted at his request. The reader may profitably compare its statements with those made in the article by Mr. A. S. Salley, Jr., in the last number of the REVIEW (XIII. 16-43). ED.]

IN May, 1775, delegates, elected by the voters of Mecklenburg County, North Carolina, met in Charlotte and adopted a set of resolutions. In June following, these resolutions were printed in the Cape Fear Mercury, a newspaper published in Wilmington, N. C. On June 30, of the same year the colonial governor of North Carolina sent a copy of the Mercury containing the resolutions to the Earl of Dartmouth, who filed the paper in the British archives.

In 1819 a controversy, which has lasted until the present time, arose as to the purport of the resolutions printed in the Cape Fear Mercury of June, 1775, some disputants claiming that they were a Declaration of Independence, while their opponents contended that the resolutions made no demand for a separation of Mecklenburg County from Great Britain.

In order to settle the controversy some of the friends of the Declaration visited the British State Paper Office in order to examine the resolutions printed in the Cape Fear Mercury filed there. They found the paper gone and in its place a note in pencil containing this memorandum, "Taken out by Mr. Turner for Mr. Stevenson August 15th., 1837 ".1

Who was Mr. Stevenson? Evidently a follower of Thomas Jefferson, whose friends were doing their utmost to hinder the establishment of the genuineness of the Mecklenburg Declaration and thereby prevent that statesman's being deemed a plagiarist, for according to Appleton's Cyclopaedia of American Biography Hon. Andrew Stevenson was born in Virginia in 1784, belonged to the Democratic party and was a prominent member of the state legislature and of Congress for twenty years just previous to Mr. Jefferson's death in 1826.

At the time Mr. Stevenson borrowed the Mercury from the British archives that gentleman was United States minister at the Court of St. James, and, it seems, was suspected of having more than a passing interest in the Declaration controversy. For in the year 1838, the year after Mr. Stevenson obtained the Mercury from the archives and 1 Page 54, Draper's manuscript in the library of the Wisconsin State Historical Society at Madison.

while he still resided in London, the book, Memorials of North Carolina, appeared. And its author, J. Seawell Jones, who has evidently heard. of the minister's search for the Mercury, gives way to his vexation thus: "It has been intimated to me by a friend that the present Envoy Extraordinary of the Government of the United States, near the throne of England, had been entrusted with a commission to explore the Archives of the Colonial Office for evidence against the Mecklenburg Declaration. Under whose superintendence and advice this exploring expedition was gotten up it does not behoove me to say, but I can certainly wish it's worthy commander whatever success he may deserve. He may depend upon his deserts being fairly and thoroughly canvassed whenever the fruits of his expedition shall be disclosed to the public."

That Mr. Stevenson borrowed the Cape Fear Mercury from the British archives is beyond question, for Lyman Draper in the manuscript already referred to remarks: "Upon Colonel Wheeler's return to this country he applied to Hon. J. W. Stevenson of Kentucky, son of the deceased Minister to England, concerning the missing copy of the Cape Fear Mercury, and the answer was, though the missing copy could not be found, dispatches and other memoranda among the deceased Minister's papers indicates that the copy had once been in his possession."

Notwithstanding J. Seawell Jones's reflections upon Minister Stevenson, that dignitary lived through nearly twenty years of the Mecklenburg controversy, dying in 1857 without divulging the contents of the Cape Fear Mercury to his opponents or the public, and thereby raised a presumption against himself.

In 1838, the year after Mr. Stevenson obtained the Cape Fear Mercury, Colonel Peter Force of Washington, D. C., discovered some resolutions that purported to have been adopted at Charlotte on May 31, 1775, and on account of their date are known as the Thirty-first Resolves. The fact of their discovery was announced in the National Intelligencer in December, 1838. Immediately upon this find, the doubters, as the opponents of the genuineness of the Mecklenburg

Declaration

are called, contended that the resolutions brought to light

by Colonel Force were identical with those printed in the Cape Fear

Mercury.

Yet Mr. Stevenson, who had read the resolutions in the

Mercury, and, for that reason, could have settled the controversy for all time, remained dumb throughout the entire discussion, which continued through the remaining years of his life.

While it is to be regretted that Mr. Stevenson, for reasons best known to himself, did not let the public know whether the resolutions that he saw in the Mercury were a Declaration of Independence or the Thirty-first Resolves, we are not without information as to the intent of the resolutions printed there.

Fortunately for us the Governor of North Carolina in 1775, who read the proceedings at Charlotte printed in the Cape Fear Mercury and then transmitted the newspaper to the Earl of Dartmouth, has