Page:American Historical Review, Volume 12.djvu/898

 888 Reviews of Books to the successive prevalence of the new Tories over their temporary allies by the accession of Shelburne to the premiership on the death of Rockingham and by the decisive victory of Pitt over Fox. These events and the subsequent reform, whereby Pitt embodied in the gov- ernment of England the constitutional and economic ideas of Chatham and Smith, occupy the first half of this volume. In the second, the nar- rative passes largely to other than domestic affairs, to Pitt's colonial policy, and to the share of England, under his guidance, in the European diplomacy which culminated in the struggle with France. In both portions of the volume Professor Salomon displays in his narrative the freshness and virility of the investigator. His search for new material has been careful; and he is able to report, in this respect, good results. At the same time, he warns against the heresy that unprinted material must necessarily supersede the printed. Printed material indeed, if sufficiently neglected, becomes a mine for the historian. As a case in point. Professor Salomon cites the English Parliamentary Debates, too little regarded even in England; and he remarks well that the biographer of an English statesman, if he neglect these debates merely because they are printed and easily accessible, will forego the very material which any other biographer would covet. Professor Salomon himself has given them all the attention and weight due in the case of Pitt, whose life centred, to a degree unusual with English statesmen, in West- minster. In this and other points, the author, who is not a stranger to England, has shown an insight, and possibly a sympathy which have drawn upon him the censure, by at least one of his countrymen, that he is no longer a cold critic of English institutions. By English readers the fault, if it exist, will be lightly forgiven. H. M. Bowman. Napoleon's Campaign in Poland, 1806-1807. By F. Loraixe Petre. (London and New York: John Lane Company. 1906. Pp. xxiii, 339.) It is a pleasure to take up a volume with such excellent paper and type : the manufacture of the book calls for especial praise. Its author has found in English no detailed work on this campaign, which he feels " could not be less interesting than . . . Austerlitz and Jena "; and he has filled the gap by patient study, though his list of authorities is not exhaustive. The book begins with a chapter on the state of Europe in 1805 and 1806, with a crisp sketch of the armies, the leaders and the lieutenants on both sides, and gives a careful description of the topographical features of the difficult theatre of war — its marshes and forests, its mud and snow, its summer heat and winter tempests. Then follow the several operations, from that beginning in November and culminating in the battles of Pultusk and Golymin at Christmastide, 1806, through the butchery of Eylau in February and its succeeding winter quarters, the siege of Danzig, and the " final triumph " at Heils-