The Sun.
London, England, 1864-03-07 00:00:00

14 I T...E RATUR E,

?he Statesman's Year Book. For 1804. By Pre-
derlck Martin. One Vol., pp. 684. Macmillan
and Co.
Without one particle of hesitation, we at once
pronounce this volume to be the most comprehen-
sive Book of Information—revealing the World As
It Is—that has ever yet made its appearance.
Now that it is within our hands the marvel with
us is, how we could have remained contented with-
out it, or at any rate without something very like
it, something approximating to it in the variety
and accuracy of the facts and figures it has now col-
lected together for the first time. Once issued from
the press, as it happily is now, and that, more-
over, in a sufficiently substantial, and (remem-
bering this to be the first publication of it) in a
really wonderfully complete form—once issued
from the press, as it is now, we cannot believe that
the annual publication of it can ever be lightly
abandoned. It at once assumes its place as a dis-
tinct necessity in the great world of politics, and as
a luxury, as well as a necessity to Statesmen and to
jotsrnalists. The idea of the work appears to have
been suggested to the able and ingenious compiler
of it, by a casual remark uttered by the late Sir
Robert Peel—the great Sir Robert Peel—some 15
years ago. Precisely the very Book Sir Robert then
mentioned as one urgently required by all classes
of intelligent men-of-education in this country, but
more especially by the busy class of politicians, has
here in ithis goodly tome of nearly 700 pages, at
last, after 15 years further waiting without it, been
published. A Book, it is, giving a complete and
perfectly reliable account of all the States of Europe,
without exception, as well as of all the principal
States of Asia, of the two Americas, and of Austral-
asia, considering each of them under its three most
remarkable aspects in the eyes of every man of the
world—namely, its aspects political, social, and com-
mercial. In doing this, the compiler has begun his
work of delineation, in every instance, wisely, from
a distinct point : that is to say, as he himself ex-
presses it in his Preface, " beginning at the apex
and endir.g at the base of the various forms of
constituted society." The apex, here, meaning
obviously, as the contents show indeed by their
arrangement—the reigning sovereigns, whenever
the form of government is in any way monarchical
—in point of fact, in every case, without exception,
under whatever name, style, or title the head of the
State may chance to be designated—Pontiff, Em-
peror, Sultan, Caliph, Czar, Kaisir, King, Queen,
Grand Duke, or President. The " base" referring
to the population, to the wealth, to the extent of
commerce, to the distribution of industry, and so
forth. Under their several heads, we have here, in
regard to each State, in due turn presented to us
sections or minor treatises upon the State's Constitue
tion and Government, upon its Religiob and:Educa-
tion, upon its Army and Navy, upon its Trade and
Commerce, and, in the instance, respectively,of each
great European State, upon its Colonies. Opinions,
one way or another, for or against, will be found
to have been carefully, scrupulously, conscientiously
excluded from the work altogether. Facts alone
are given. Facts, that is to say, and figures.
Minute and elaborate accounts of all the
States and all the Sovereigns of the Civilised
World (for this present year of grace 1864)—ac-
counts statistical, genealogical, historical, political,
ethical, geographical, commercial! Altogether a
wonderful repertory of information ; and informa-
tion—so far as we have yet been enabled to test it
—reliable in its accuracy to an extraordinary
degree. As to the marvellous character of the
information here brought together, or focussed, let
us take a single haphazard instance by way of illus-
tration. We will open the volume as nearly as
possible at the middle, Pages 326 and 327 there-
upon confront us. And upon the latter
we find epitomised the ecclesiastical admi-
nistration presided over in the Eternal City by
the Sovereign Pontiff. Assisting the Pontiff him-
self, the members of the College of Cardinals—Six
of them Cardinal Bishops, Fifty Cardinal Priests,
Fourteen Cardinal Deacons. Spiritually subject to
the Pontiff—Twelve Patriarchates —176 Arch-
bishoprics-794 Bishoprics ! And so forth—a won-
derful organisation ! In the compilation of the
work Mr. Frederick Martin appears to have
exercised extraordinary discretion. The masses of
details requiring to be here sifted and systematised,
some of them even carefully to be tabulated, must
have been enough, by reason of their very multi-
, plicity and diversity, to bewilder any compiler.
The compiler in this instance, however, they have
in no way whatever bewildered. We cannot re-
member any inaugural issue of any elaborate guide-
book, designed to have thenceforth an annual edition
of it published, at once so full and so accurate in its
information as The Statesman's Year Book,
now issued for the first time for this current year of
grace 1864 by the Messrs. Macmillan, of London
and Cambridge. There are no signs whatever dis-
coverable anywhere in it, of anything whatever
crude, jejune, confused, or precipitate. The contents
have been put together manifestly with the utmost
possible deliberation. They have been accumulated
from the most authentic sources. They have been
selected with an eye in every instance to their intrin-
sic worth, and portioned out with a due regard
to their relative importance. Now, especially,
at this time, in the very thick of the Parliamentary
Session the volume comes to hand with an ap-
positeness rendering it as a book of ready and re-
liable reference thrice welcome. Those who em-
ploy it as such, namely, as a book of frequent
reference, will certainly not be long in arriving at
the conclusion that both the compiler and the
publishers of it ought to be ranked among the
number of our intellectual benefactors.