Topics and Biographical Notes.
An excellent feature of the political and constitutional history is the presence of brief biographical sketches of important statesmen. For teachers who prefer to teach American government in connection with the history, special provision is made by means of marginal references and supplementary questions, and an elaborate outline of topics arising in the text is added (Appendix I, pp. 527-534), with appropriate references to the Constitution and to the authors’ “Government in State and Nation.” This is further supplemented by a list of topics, relating to other features of our government not naturally arising in a history course.
The book is provided with abundant and well-selected illustrations, from authentic sources; the maps are numerous and helpful, but not distinctive. At the end of each chapter are suggestive and stimulating topics and questions, with references within the compass of high school pupils. These references are almost unique in that they are specific and brief.
A few inaccuracies and misleading statements have been noticed: The statement, “There was no gold in this region” (p. 23), referring to Spanish territory in the United States, should be modified. None was found. For “Eyler” read Tyler (p. 67); for “Cheney” (p. 91), read Cheyney. The remark respecting the slave trade, that “during colonial times no protest seems to have arisen against the wickedness and inhumanity of this traffic” (p. 131) loses sight of the Mennonite protest of 1688, as well as the work and writings of John Woolman, Anthony Benezet, and others. Finally, Connecticut is correctly stated Democratic in the text, but erroneously Republican in the Election Map of 1876 (p. 447).
Taken as a whole, the book is well adapted to its purpose. The style is usually simple and direct; facts are well selected and are clearly and impartially stated; the scholarship is of a high order. The index might be made fuller with profit.
[“American History.” By James Alton James, Professor of History in Northwestern University, and Albert Hart Sanford, Professor of History in the Stevens Point, Wisconsin State Normal School. New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons. 1909. Pp. xvii, 563.]
Ancient History in the Secondary School
WILLIAM FAIRLEY, Ph.D., Editor.
EARLY GREECE