The cover image was created by the transcriber and is placed in the public domain.

THE COMPLETE WORKS

OF

JOHN RUSKIN

VOLUME XXIII

ARROWS OF THE CHACE

VOLUMES I-II

ARROWS OF THE CHACE
BEING
A COLLECTION OF SCATTERED LETTERS
PUBLISHED CHIEFLY IN THE DAILY NEWSPAPERS
1840-1880
VOLUME II.
LETTERS ON POLITICS, ECONOMY, AND MISCELLANEOUS MATTERS

"I NEVER WROTE A LETTER IN MY LIFE WHICH ALL THE WORLD ARE NOT WELCOME TO READ IF THEY WILL."

Fors Clavigera, Letter 59, 1875.

CONTENTS OF VOLUME II.

NOTE TO THE SECOND VOLUME.

The letters relating to Mr. Ruskin's candidature for the Lord Rectorship of Glasgow University were published when this volume was almost out of the printer's hands. They have however been included, by Mr. Ruskin's wish, and will be found at the end of this volume, where a letter to the late Mr. W. H. Harrison, which has just been brought to my notice, and two very recent letters on Dramatic Reform, have, at the cost of some delay, been also added.—[Ed.]

November 15, 1880.

CHRONOLOGICAL LIST OF THE LETTERS CONTAINED IN THE SECOND VOLUME.

Note.—In the second and third columns the bracketed words and figures are more or less certainly conjectured; whilst those unbracketed give the actual dating of the letters.

LETTERS ON POLITICS AND WAR.

The Italian Question. 1859.
(Three letters: June 6, June 15, and August 1.)
The Foreign Policy of England. 1863.
The Position of Denmark. 1864.
The Jamaica Insurrection. 1865.
The Franco-Prussian War. 1870.
(Two letters: October 6 and 7.)
Modern Warfare. 1876.

ARROWS OF THE CHACE.

LETTERS ON POLITICS AND WAR.

[From "The Scotsman," July 20, 1859.]
THE ITALIAN QUESTION.[1]
Berlin, June 6, 1859.

I have been thinking of sending a few lines about what I have seen of Austrians and Italians; but every time I took my pen and turned from my own work about clouds and leafage to think for a few minutes concerning political clouds and thickets, I sank into a state of amazement which reduced me to helpless silence. I will try and send you an incoherent line to-day; for the smallest endeavor at coherence will bring me into that atmosphere of astonishment again, in which I find no expression.

You northern Protestant people are always overrating the value of Protestantism as such. Your poetical clergymen make sentimental tours in the Vaudois country, as if there were no worthy people in the Alps but the Vaudois. Did the enlightened Edinburgh evangelicals never take any interest in the freedom of the Swiss, nor hear of such people as Winkelried or Tell? Not but that there is some chance of Tell disappearing one of these days under acutest historical investigation.

Still, he, or somebody else, verily got Switzerland rid of much evil, and made it capable of much good; and if you examine the influence of the battles of Morgarten and Sempach on European history, you will find they were good and true pieces of God's work.[2] Do people suppose they were done by Protestants? Switzerland owes all that she is—all that she is ever likely to be—to her stout and stern Roman Catholics, faithful to their faith to this day—they, and the Tyrolese, about the truest Roman Catholics in Christendom and certainly among its worthiest people, though they laid your Zuingli and a good deal of ranting Protestantism which Zuingli in vain tried to make either rational or charitable, dead together on the green meadows of Cappel, and though the Tyrolese marksmen at this moment are following up their rifle practice to good purpose, and with good will, with your Vaudois hearts for targets.

The amazement atmosphere keeps floating with its edges about me, though I write on as fast as I can in hopes of keeping out of it. You Scotch, and we English!! to keep up the miserable hypocrisy of calling ourselves Protestants! And here have been two of the most powerful protests (sealed with quite as much blood as is usually needed for such documents) that ever were made against the Papacy—one in 1848,[3] and one now—twenty thousand men or thereabouts lying, at this time being, in the form of torn flesh and shattered bones, among the rice marshes of the Novarrese, and not one jot of our precious Protestant blood gone to the signature. Not so much as one noble flush of it, that I can see, on our clay cheeks, besmirched, as they are, with sweat and smoke; but all for gold, and out of chimneys. Of sweat for bread that perishes not, or of the old Sinai smoke for honor of God's law, and revelation thereof—no drop nor shadow. Not so much as a coroner's inquest on those dead bodies in the rice fields—dead men who must have been murdered by somebody. If a drunken man falls in a ditch, you will have your Dogberry and Verges talk over him by way of doing justice; but your twenty thousand—not drunken, but honest, respectable, well-meaning, and serviceable men—are made rice manure of, and you think it is all right. We Protestants indeed! The Italians are Protestants, and in a measure the French—nay, even the Austrians (at all events those conical-hatted mountaineers), according to their understanding of the matter. What we are, Moloch or Mammon, or the Protestant devil make up of both, perhaps knows.

Do not think I dislike the Austrians. I have great respect and affection for them, and I have seen more of them in familiar intercourse than most Englishmen. One of my best friends in Venice in the winter of 1849-50 was the Artillery officer who had directed the fire on the side of Mestre in 1848. I have never known a nobler person. Brave, kind, and gay—as gentle as a lamb, as playful as a kitten—knightly in courtesy and in all tones of thought—ready at any instant to lay down his life for his country or his Emperor. He was by no means a rare instance either of gentleness or of virtue among the men whom the Liberal portion of our English press represent as only tyrants and barbarians. Radetzky himself was one of the kindest of men—his habitual expression was one of overflowing bonhommie, or of fatherly regard for the welfare of all around him. All who knew him loved him. In little things his kindness was almost ludicrous. I saw him at Verona run out of his own supper-room and return with a plate of soup in his hand, the waiters (his youngest aides-de-camp) not serving his lady guests fast enough to please him; yet they were nimble enough, as I knew in a race with two of them among the fire-flies by the Mincio, only the evening before. For a long time I regarded the Austrians as the only protection of Italy from utter dissolution (such as that which, I see to-day, it is reported that the Tuscan army has fallen into, left for five weeks to itself), and I should have looked upon them as such still, if the Sardinian Government had not shown itself fit to take their place. And the moment that any Italian Government was able to take their place, the Austrians necessarily became an obstacle to Italian progress, for all their virtues are incomprehensible to the Italians, and useless to them. Unselfish individually, the Austrians are nationally entirely selfish, and in this consists, so far as it is truly alleged against them, their barbarism. These men of whom I have been speaking would have given, any of them, life and fortune unhesitatingly, at their Emperor's bidding, but their magnanimity was precisely that of the Highlander or the Indian, incognizant of any principle of action but that of devotion to his chief or nation. All abstract grounds of conscience, all universal and human hopes, were inconceivable by them. Such men are at present capable of no feeling towards Italy but scorn; their power was like a bituminous cerecloth wrapping her corpse—it saved her from the rottenness of revolution; but it must be unwound, if the time has come for her resurrection.

I do not know if that time has come, or can come. Italy's true oppression is all her own. Spain is oppressed by the Spaniard, not by the Austrian. Greece needs but to be saved from the Greeks. No French Emperor, however mighty his arm or sound his faith, can give Italy freedom.

"A gift of that which is not to be given
By all the associate powers of earth and heaven."

But the time is come at least to bid her be free, if she has the power of freedom. It is not England, certainly, who should forbid her. I believe that is what it will come to, however—not so much because we are afraid of Napoleon, as because we are jealous of him. But of him and us I have something more to say than there is time for to-night. These good, stupid, affectionate, faithful Germans, too (grand fellows under arms; I never imagined so magnificent a soldiery as 15,000 of them which I made a shift to see, through sand clouds, march past the Prince Frederick William[4] on Saturday morning last). But to hear them fretting and foaming at the French getting into Milan!—they having absolutely no other idea on all this complicated business than that French are fighting Germans! Wrong or right, why or wherefore, matters not a jot to them. French are fighting Germans—somehow, somewhere, for some reason—and beer and Vaterland are in peril, and the English in fault, as we are assuredly, but not on that side, for I believe it to be quite true which a French friend, high in position, says in a letter this morning—"If the English had not sympathized with the Austrians there would have been no war." By way of keeping up the character of incoherence to which I have vowed myself, I may tell you that before that French letter came, I received another from a very sagacious Scotch friend (belonging, as I suppose most Scotch people do, to the class of persons who call themselves "religious"), containing this marvellous enunciation of moral principle, to be acted upon in difficult circumstances, "Mind your own business." It is a serviceable principle enough for men of the world, but a surprising one in the mouth of a person who professes to be a Bible obeyer. For, as far as I remember the tone of that obsolete book, "our own" is precisely the last business which it ever tells us to mind. It tells us often to mind God's business, often to mind other people's business; our own, in any eager or earnest way, not at all. "What thy hand findeth to do." Yes; but in God's fields, not ours. One can imagine the wiser fishermen of the Galilean lake objecting to Peter and Andrew that they were not minding their business, much more the commercial friends of Levi speaking with gentle pity of him about the receipt of Custom. "A bad man of business always—see what has come of it—quite mad at last."

And my astonishing friend went on to say that this was to be our principle of action "where the path was not quite clear"—as if any path ever was clear till you got to the end of it, or saw it a long way off; as if all human possibility of path was not among clouds and brambles—often cold, always thorny—misty with roses occasionally, or dim with dew, often also with shadow of Death—misty, more particularly in England just now, with shadow of that commercially and otherwise valuable smoke before spoken of.

However, if the path is not to be seen, it may be felt, or at least tumbled off, without any particular difficulty. This latter course of proceeding is our probablest, of course.—But I can't write any more to-night. I am, etc.,

J. Ruskin.

Note to p. [6].—The lines quoted are from Wordsworth's "Poems dedicated to National Independence and Liberty," Part II., Sonnet i. The second line should read, "By all the blended powers of earth and heaven."

FOOTNOTES:

[1] This and the two following letters deal, it will be seen, with "the Italian question" in 1859, when the peace of Europe was disturbed by the combined action of France and Sardinia against Austria in the cause of Italian independence. Of these three letters the first was written two days after the defeat of the Austrians at Magenta, followed by the entrance into Milan of the French, and the second a few days before the similar victory of the French and Sardinian armies at Solferino.

[2] Few readers need be reminded of the position of Tell in the list of Swiss patriots (pace the "acutest historical investigation," which puts him in the list of mythical personages) in the early part of the fourteenth century; of Arnold von Winkelried who met the heroic death, by which he secured his country's freedom, at Sempach in 1386; or of Ulrich Zuingli, the Swiss Protestant leader of his time, who fell at Cappel, in the war of the Reformed against the Romish cantons, in 1531. At the battle of Morgarten, in 1315, twenty thousand Austrians were defeated by no more than thirteen hundred Swiss, with such valor that the name of the victors' canton was thereupon extended to the whole country, thenceforth called Switzerland.

It may be further noted that Arnold of Sempach is, with Leonidas, Curtius, and Sir Richard Grenville, named amongst the types of "the divinest of sacrifices, that of the patriot for his country," in Mr. Ruskin's Preface, "Bibliotheca Pastorum," Vol. i. p. xxxiii.

[3] The year of the Lombard insurrection, when Radetzky, the Austrian field-marshal, defeated the insurgents at Custozza near Verona. Radetzky died in 1858.

[4] The Prince Frederick William, now Emperor of Germany (having succeeded his brother Frederick William IV. in January, 1861), was at the date of this letter Regent of Prussia, and Commander-in-chief of the Prussian forces.

[From the "Scotsman," July 23, 1859.]
THE ITALIAN QUESTION.
Berlin, June 15.

You would have had this second letter sooner, had I not lost myself, after despatching the first, in farther consideration of the theory of Non-Intervention, or minding one's own business. What, in logical terms, is the theory? If one sees a costermonger wringing his donkey's tail, is it proper to "intervene"? and if one sees an Emperor or a System wringing a nation's neck, is it improper to intervene? Or is the Intervention allowable only in the case of hides, not of souls? for even so, I think you might find among modern Italians many quite as deserving of intervention as the donkey. Or is interference allowable when one person does one wrong to another person, but not when two persons do two wrongs to two, or three to three, or a multitude to a multitude; and is there any algebraic work on these square and cube roots of morality wherein I may find how many coadjutors or commissions any given crooked requires to make it straight? Or is it a geographical question; and may one advisably interfere at Berwick but not at Haddington? Or is there any graduated scale of intervention, practicable according to the longitude? I see my way less clearly, because the illustrations of the theory of Non-intervention are as obscure as its statement. The French are at present happy and prosperous; content with their ruler and themselves; their trade increasing, and their science and art advancing; their feelings towards other nations becoming every day more just. Under which circumstances we English non-interventionalists consider it our duty to use every means in our power of making the ruler suspected by the nation, and the nation unmanageable by the ruler. We call both all manner of names; exhaust every term of impertinence and every method of disturbance; and do our best, in indirect and underhand ways, to bring about revolution, assassination, or any other close of the existing system likely to be satisfactory to Royals[5] in general. This is your non-intervention when a nation is prosperous.

On the other hand, the Italian nation is unhappy and unprosperous; its trade annihilated, its arts and sciences retrograde, its nerve and moral sense prostrated together; it is capable only of calling to you for help, and you will not help it. The man you have been calling names, with his unruly colonels, undertakes to help it, and Christian England, with secret hope that, in order to satisfy her spite against the unruly colonels, the French army may be beaten, and the Papacy fully established over the whole of Italy—Christian England, I say, with this spiteful jealousy for one of her motives, and a dim, stupid, short-sighted, sluggish horror of interruption of business for the other, takes, declaratively and ostensibly, this highly Christian position. "Let who will prosper or perish, die or live—let what will be declared or believed—let whatsoever iniquity be done, whatsoever tyranny be triumphant, how many soever of faithful or fiery soldiery be laid in new embankments of dead bodies along those old embankments of Mincio and Brenta; yet will we English drive our looms, cast up our accounts, and bet on the Derby, in peace and gladness; our business is only therewith; for us there is no book of fate, only ledgers and betting-books; for us there is no call to meddle in far-away business. See ye to it. We wash our hands of it in that sea-foam of ours; surely the English Channel is better than Abana and Pharpar, or than the silver basin which Pilate made use of, and our soap is of the best almond-cake."

I hear the Derby was great this year.[6] I wonder, sometimes, whether anybody has ever calculated, in England, how much taxation the nation pays annually for the maintenance of that great national institution. Observe—what I say of the spirit in which the English bear themselves at present, is founded on what I myself have seen and heard, not on what I read in journals. I read them little at home—here I hardly see them. I have no doubt that in the Liberal papers one might find much mouthing about liberty, as in the Conservative much about order, it being neither liberty nor order which is wanted, but Justice. You may have Freedom of all Abomination, and Order of all Iniquity—if you look for Forms instead of Facts. Look for the facts first—the doing of justice howsoever and by whatsoever forms or informalities. And the forms will come—shapely enough, and sightly enough, afterwards. Yet, perhaps, not till long afterwards. Earnest as I am for the freedom of Italy, no one can hope less from it, for many a year to come. Even those Vaudois, whom you Presbyterians admire so much, have made as yet no great show of fruit out of their religious freedom. I went up from Turin to Torre di Lucerna to look at them last year. I have seldom slept in a dirtier inn, seldom seen peasants' cottages so ill built, and never yet in my life saw anywhere paths so full of nettles. The faces of the people are interesting, and their voices sweet, except in howlings on Sunday evening, which they performed to a very disquieting extent in the street till about half-past ten, waking me afterwards between twelve and one with another "catch," and a dance through the village of the liveliest character. Protestantism is apt sometimes to take a gayer character abroad than with us. Geneva has an especially disreputable look on Sunday evenings, and at Hanover I see the shops are as wide open on Sunday as Saturday; here, however, in Berlin, they shut up as close as you do at Edinburgh. I think the thing that annoyed me most at La Tour, however, was the intense sectarianism of the Protestant dogs. I can make friends generally, fast enough, with any canine or feline creature; but I could make nothing of those evangelical brutes, and there was as much snarling and yelping that afternoon before I got past the farmhouses to the open hill-side, as in any of your Free Church discussions. It contrasted very painfully with the behavior of such Roman Catholic dogs as I happen to know—St. Bernard's and others—who make it their business to entertain strangers. But the hill-side was worth reaching—for though that Lucerna valley is one of the least interesting I ever saw in the Alps, there is a craggy ridge on the north of it which commands a notable view. In about an hour and a half's walking you may get up to the top of a green, saddle-shaped hill, which separates the Lucerna valley from that of Angrogna; if then, turning to the left (westward), you take the steepest way you can find up the hill, another couple of hours will bring you to a cone of stones which the shepherds have built on the ridge, and there you may see all the historical sites of the valley of Angrogna as in a map—and as much of Monte Viso and Piedmont as clouds will let you. I wish I could draw you a map of Piedmont as I saw it that afternoon. The air was half full of white cumulus clouds, lying nearly level about fifteen hundred feet under the ridge; and through every gap of them a piece of Piedmont with a city or two. Turin, twenty-eight miles away as the bird flies, shows through one cloud-opening like a handful of golden sand in a pool of blue sea.

I've no time to write any more to-day, for I've been to Charlottenburg, out of love for Queen Louise.[7] I can't see a good painting of her anywhere, and they show her tomb by blue light, like the nun scene in Robert le Diable. A German woman's face, if beautiful at all, is exquisitely beautiful; but it depends mainly on the thoughtfulness of the eyes, and the bright hair. It rarely depends much upon the nose, which has perhaps a tendency to be—if anything—a little too broadish and flattish—perhaps one might even say in some cases, knobbish. (The Hartz mountains, I see, looking at them from Brunswick, have similar tendencies, less excusably and more decidedly.) So when the eyes are closed—and for the soft hair one has only furrowed marble—and the nose to its natural disadvantages adds that of being seen under blue light, the general effect is disappointing.

Frederick the Great's celebrated statue is at the least ten yards too high[8] from the ground to be of any use; one sees nothing but the edges of the cloak he never wore, the soles of his boots, and, in a redundant manner, his horse's tail. Under which vertically is his Apotheosis. In which process he sits upon the back of an eagle, and waves a palm, with appearance of satisfaction to himself, and it is to be hoped no danger of any damage to three stars in the neighborhood.

Kiss's Amazon makes a good grotesque for the side of the Museum steps; it was seen to disadvantage in London. The interior of the gallery is very beautiful in many ways; and Holbein's portrait of George Gyzen is worth coming all the way from England to see only ten minutes. I never saw so noble a piece of work of its kind in my life.

Believe me, etc.,
J. Ruskin.

FOOTNOTES:

[5] A misprint for "Rogues." See next letter, p. [13].

[6] "Magnificent weather and excellent sport made the great people's meeting pass off with great éclat." ("Annual Register" for 1859, p. 73.) The race was won by Sir J. Hawley's Musjid.

[7] The mother of the present Emperor, whose treatment by Napoleon I., and whose own admirable qualities, have won for her the tender and affectionate memory of her people. She died in 1810. Her tomb at Charlottenburg is the work of the German sculptor, Christian Rauch.

[8] The full height of this statue (also the work of Rauch) is, inclusive of the pedestal, somewhat over forty-two feet from the ground. One of the bas-relief tablets which flank the pedestal represents the Apotheosis of the monarch. The visitor to Berlin may recall August Kiss's bronze group, representing the combat of an Amazon with a tiger, on the right side of the Old Museum steps; and Holbein's portrait of George Gyzen, a merchant of London, is No. 586 in the picture galleries of the Museum. It is described by Mr. Ruskin in his article on "Sir Joshua and Holbein" in the Cornhill Magazine of March, 1860, and also in Wornum's "Life and Works of Holbein," p. 260 (London, 1867).

[From "The Scotsman," August 6, 1859.]
THE ITALIAN QUESTION.
Schaffhausen, August 1, 1859.

Letter to the Editor (of "The Scotsman").

Sir: I have just received the number of the Scotsman containing my second letter from Berlin, in which there is rather an awkward misprint of "royals" for "rogues," which must have puzzled some of your readers, no less than the general tone of the letter, written as it was for publication at another time, and as one of a series begun in another journal. I am obliged by the admission of the letter into your columns; and I should have been glad to continue in those columns the series I intended, had not the refusal of this letter by the Witness[9] shown me the liability to misapprehension under which I should be writing. I had thought that, seeing for these twenty years I have been more or less conversant with Italy and the Italians, a few familiar letters written to a personal friend, at such times as I could win from my own work, might not have been uninteresting to Scottish readers, even though my opinions might occasionally differ sharply from theirs, or be expressed in such rough way as strong opinions must be, when one has no time to polish them into more pleasing presentability. The refusal of the letter by the Witness showed me that this was not so; and as I have no leisure to take up the subject methodically, I must leave what I have written in its present imperfect form. It is indeed not mainly a question of time, which I would spend gladly, though to handle the subject of the present state of Italy with any completeness would involve a total abandonment of other work for some weeks. But I feel too deeply in this matter to allow myself to think of it continuously. To me, the state of the modern political mind, which hangs the slaughter of twenty thousand men, and the destinies of twenty myriads of human souls, on the trick that transforms a Ministry, or the chances of an enlarged or diminished interest in trade, is something so horrible that I find no utterance wherewith to characterize it—nor any courage wherewith to face the continued thought of it, unless I had clear expectation of doing good by the effort—expectation which the mere existence of the fact forbids. I leave therefore the words I have written to such work as they may; hoping, indeed, nothing from any words; thankful, if a few people here and there understand and sympathize in the feelings with which they were written; and thankful, if none so sympathize, that I am able at least to claim some share in the sadness, though not in the triumph, of the words of Farinata—

"Fu' io sol colà, dove sofferto
Fu per ciascun di torre via Fiorenza,
Colui che la difese a viso aperto."[10]

I am, etc., J. Ruskin.

FOOTNOTES:

[9] After a careful and repeated search in the columns of the Witness, I am still unable to certainly explain these allusions. It seems, however, that the two preceding letters had been sent to the Witness, which printed the first and refused to print the second. The Scotsman printed both under the titles of "Mr. Ruskin on the Italian Question," and "Mr. Ruskin on Foreign Politics," whilst it distinguished this third letter by the additional heading of "Letter to the Editor." It may be conjectured, therefore, that the first two letters were reprinted by the Scotsman from another paper, and that, in receiving the number of the Scotsman containing the second, Mr. Ruskin did not know that it had reprinted the first also. As to the "series begun in another journal," it is, I think, clear that it had not been long continued, as the letter dated "June 15," sent to and refused by it, is spoken of as "the second letter," so that that dated "June 6" must have been the first, as this was unquestionably the last of the series.

[10]

"But singly there I stood, when, by consent
Of all, Florence had to the ground been razed,
The one who openly forbade the deed."

Cary's Dante—"L'Inferno," x. II. 90-93.

Farinata degli Uberti was a noble Florentine, and the leader of the Ghibelline faction, when they obtained a signal victory over the Guelfi at Montaperto, near the river Arbia. Machiavelli calls him "a man of exalted soul, and great military talents" (Hist. of Florence, Bk. ii). Subsequently, when it was proposed that, in order to maintain the ascendency of the Ghibelline faction in Tuscany, Florence should be destroyed, Farinata alone of all the Council opposed the measure, declaring that he had endured every hardship with no other view than that of being able to pass his days in his own country. (See Cary's notes to Canto x.)

[From "The Liverpool Albion," November 2, 1863.]
THE FOREIGN POLICY OF ENGLAND.[11]
Zurich, Oct. 25th, 1863.

Sir: I beg to acknowledge your favor of the 20th of October. My health does not now admit of my taking part frequently in public business; yet I should have held it a duty to accept the invitation of the directors of the Liverpool Institute, but that, for the time being, my temper is at fault, as well as my health; and I am wholly unable to go on with any of my proper work, owing to the horror and shame with which I regard the political position taken, or rather sunk into, by England in her foreign relations—especially in the affairs of Italy and Poland.[12] What these matters have to do with Art may not at first be clear, but I can perhaps make it so by a short similitude. Suppose I had been engaged by an English gentleman to give lectures on Art to his son. Matters at first go smoothly, and I am diligent in my definitions of line and color, until, one Sunday morning at breakfast time, a ticket-of-leave man takes a fancy to murder a girl in the road leading round the lawn, before the house-windows. My patron, hearing the screams, puts down his paper, adjusts his spectacles, slowly apprehends what is going on, and rings the bells for his smallest footman. "John, take my card and compliments to that gentleman outside the hedge, and tell him that his proceedings are abnormal, and, I may add, to me personally—offensive. Had that road passed through my property, I should have felt it my duty to interfere." John takes the card, and returns with it; the ticket-of-leave man finishes his work at his leisure; but, the screams ceasing as he fills the girl's mouth with clay, the English gentleman returns to his muffins, and congratulates himself on having "kept out of that mess." Presently afterwards he sends for me to know if I shall be ready to lecture on Monday. I am somewhat nervous, and answer—I fear rudely—"Sir, your son is a good lad; I hope he will grow to be a man—but, for the present, I cannot teach him anything. I should like, indeed, to teach you something, but have no words for the lesson." Which indeed I have not. If I say any words on such matters, people ask me, "Would I have the country go to war? do I know how dreadful a thing war is?" Yes, truly, I know it. I like war as ill as most people—so ill, that I would not spend twenty millions a year in making machines for it, neither my holidays and pocket money in playing at it; yet I would have the country go to war, with haste, in a good quarrel; and, which is perhaps eccentric in me, rather in another's quarrel than in her own. We say of ourselves complacently that we will not go to war for an idea; but the phrase interpreted means only, that we will go to war for a bale of goods, but not for justice nor for mercy; and I would ask you to favor me so far as to read this letter to the students at your meeting, and say to them that I heartily wish them well; but for the present I am too sad to be of any service to them; that our wars in China and Japan[13] are not likely to furnish good subjects for historical pictures; that "ideas" happen, unfortunately, to be, in Art, the principal things; and that a country which will not fight for its ideas is not likely to have anything worth painting.

I have the honor to be, Sir, your faithful servant,
J. Ruskin.
The Secretary of the Liverpool Institute.

FOOTNOTES:

[11] This letter was written in answer to a request that Mr. Ruskin would come and preside at the distribution of prizes among the students in the Science and Art Department of the Liverpool Institute, on Saturday, Oct. 31, 1863. It was subsequently read on the occasion of distribution, in accordance with the wish expressed towards the end of the letter.

[12] See the preceding and the following letter. This one was, it will be seen, written in the year of the last great struggle of Poland against Russia.

[13] A The expedition of the English and French against China was begun in the August of 1860; the war in Japan in the summer of 1863.

[From "The Morning Post," July 7, 1864.]
THE POSITION OF DENMARK.

To the Editor of "The Morning Post."

Sir: Will you allow me, in fewest words, to say how deeply I concur in all that is said in that noble letter of Lord Townshend's published in your columns this morning—except only in its last sentence, "It is time to protest."[14] Alas! if protests were of any use, men with hearts and lips would have protested enough by this time. But they are of none, and can be of none. What true words are worth any man's utterance, while it is possible for such debates as last Monday's to be, and two English gentlemen can stand up before the English Commons to quote Virgil at each other, and round sentences, and show their fineness of wrist in their pretty little venomous carte and tierce of personality, while, even as they speak, the everlasting silence is wrapping the brave massacred Danes?[15] I do not know, never shall know, how this is possible. If a cannon shot carried off their usher's head, nay, carried off but his rod's head, at their room door, they would not round their sentences, I fancy, in asking where the shot came from; but because these infinite masses of advancing slaughter are a few hundred miles distant from them, they can speak their stage speeches out in content. Mr. Gladstone must go to places, it seems, before he can feel! Let him go to Alsen, as he went to Naples,[16] and quote Virgil to the Prussian army. The English mind, judging by your leaders, seems divided between the German-cannon nuisance and the Savoyard street-organ nuisance; but was there ever hurdy-gurdy like this dissonance of eternal talk?[17] The Savoyard at least grinds his handle one way, but these classical discords on the double pipe, like Mr. Kinglake's two tunes—past and present[18]—on Savoy and Denmark, need stricter police interference, it seems to me! The cession of Savoy was the peaceful present of a few crags, goats, and goatherds by one king to another; it was also fair pay for fair work, and, in the profoundest sense, no business of ours. Whereupon Mr. Kinglake mewed like a moonstruck cat going to be made a mummy of for Bubastis. But we saw the noble Circassian nation murdered, and never uttered word for them. We saw the noble Polish nation sent to pine in ice, and never struck blow for them. Now the nation of our future Queen calls to us for help in its last agony, and we round sentences and turn our backs. Sir, I have no words for these things, because I have no hope. It is not these squeaking puppets who play before us whom we have to accuse; it is not by cutting the strings of them that we can redeem our deadly error.

We English, as a nation, know not, and care not to know, a single broad or basic principle of human justice. We have only our instincts to guide us. We will hit anybody again who hits us. We will take care of our own families and our own pockets; and we are characterized in our present phase of enlightenment mainly by rage in speculation, lavish expenditure on suspicion or panic, generosity whereon generosity is useless, anxiety for the souls of savages, regardlessness of those of civilized nations, enthusiasm for liberation of blacks, apathy to enslavement of whites, proper horror of regicide, polite respect for populicide, sympathy with those whom we can no longer serve, and reverence for the dead, whom we have ourselves delivered to death.

I am, Sir, your faithful servant,
J. Ruskin.
Denmark Hill, July 6.

FOOTNOTES:

[14] Lord Townsend's letter was upon "The Circassian Exodus," and pointed out that a committee appointed in 1862 with the object of aiding the tribes of the Caucasus against Russia had failed in obtaining subscriptions, whilst that of 1864, for relieving the sufferers when resistance had become impossible, was more successful. "The few bestowed their sympathy upon the struggle for life; the many reserved theirs for the agonies of death.... To which side, I would ask, do reason and justice incline?" After commenting on the "tardy consolation for an evil which we have neglected to avert," and after remarking that "in the national point of view the case of Poland is an exact counterpart to that of Circassia," the letter thus concluded: "Against such a state of things it is surely time for all who feel as I do to protest."

[15] The debate (July 4, 1864) was upon the Danish question and the policy of the Government, and took place just after the end of a temporary armistice and the resumption of hostilities by the bombardment of Alsen, in the Dano-Prussian war. Alsen was taken two days after the publication of this letter. The "two English gentlemen" were Mr. D'Israeli and Mr. Gladstone (at this time Chancellor of the Exchequer), the latter of whom had quoted the lines from the sixth Æneid (ll. 489-491):

"At Danaum proceres Agamemnoniæque phalanges
Ut vidêre virum fulgentiaque arma per umbras
Ingenti trepidare metu."

[16] In 1850, when, being at Naples, Mr. Gladstone interested himself deeply in the cause and miserable condition of the political prisoners, and subsequently addressed two letters on the subject to Lord Aberdeen (see "Letters to Lord Aberdeen on the prisoners of the Neapolitan Government:" Murray, 1851).

[17] The Morning Post of July 6 contained amongst its leaders one on Denmark and Germany, and another on London street-organs, the nuisance of which had been recently brought before the House of Commons by Mr. M. T. Bass (M.P. for Derby).

[18] Mr. Alexander William Kinglake, M.P. for Bridgewater. He spoke at the above-mentioned debate, and had also taken strong interest and part in the cession of Savoy to France by Sardinia in 1860.

[From "The Daily Telegraph," December 20, 1865.]
THE JAMAICA INSURRECTION.[19]

To the Editor of "The Daily Telegraph."

Sir: Will you allow me, in this informal manner, to express what I should have wished to express by signature of the memorial you publish to-day from Huddersfield[20] respecting the Jamaica insurrection, and to thank you for your excellent article of the 15th December on the same subject. I am compelled to make this request, because I see my friend Mr. Thomas Hughes has been abetting the Radical movement against Governor Eyre; and as I employed what little influence I have with the London workmen to aid the return of Mr. Hughes for Lambeth, I may perhaps be thought to concur with him in every line of action he may see fit subsequently to adopt. Permit me, then, once for all, through your widely-read columns, to say that I did what I could towards the return both of Mr. J. S. Mill and of Mr. Hughes,[21] not because I held with them in all their opinions, or even in the main principle of their opinions, but because I knew they had a principle of opinions; that they were honest, thoughtful, and benevolent men; and far worthier to be in Parliament (even though it might be in opposition to many causes I had at heart) than any other candidates I knew. They are my opponents in many things, though I thought better of them both than that they would countenance this fatuous outcry against Governor Eyre. But in most directions of thought and action they are for Liberty, and I am for Lordship; they are Mob's men and I am a King's man. Yes, sir, I am one of those almost forgotten creatures who shrivel under your daily scorn; I am a "Conservative," and hope forever to be a Conservative in the deepest sense—a Re-former, not a De-former. Not that I like slavery, or object to the emancipation of any kind or number of blacks in due place and time. But I understand something more by "slavery" than either Mr. J. S. Mill or Mr. Hughes; and believe that white emancipation not only ought to precede, but must by law of all fate precede, black emancipation. I much dislike the slavery, to man, of an African laborer, with a spade on his shoulder; but I more dislike the slavery, to the devil, of a Calabrian robber with a gun on his shoulder. I dislike the American serf-economy, which separates, occasionally, man and wife; but I more dislike the English serf-economy, which prevents men from being able to have wives at all. I dislike the slavery which obliges women (if it does) to carry their children over frozen rivers; but I more dislike the slavery which makes them throw their children into wells. I would willingly hinder the selling of girls on the Gold Coast; but primarily, if I might, would hinder the selling of them in Mayfair. And, finally, while I regret the need that may exist among savages in a distant island for their governor to do his work sharply and suddenly on them, I far more regret the need among men of race and capacity for the work of governors when they have no governor to give it them. Of all dishonorable and impious captivities of this age, the darkest was that of England to Russia, by which she was compelled to refuse to give Greece a King when Greece besought one from her, and to permit that there should be set on the Acropolis throne no Governor Eyre, nor anything like him, but such a shadow of King as the black fates cast upon a nation for a curse, saying, "Woe to thee, O land, when thy king is a child!"[22]

Let the men who would now deserve well of England reserve their impeachments, or turn them from those among us who have saved colonies to those who have destroyed nations.

I am, Sir, yours, etc.,
J. Ruskin.[23]
Denmark Hill, Dec. 19.

FOOTNOTES:

[19] The outcry against Governor Eyre for the course he took in suppressing the negro insurrection at Morant Bay, Jamaica, in 1865, is still within the memory of the general public. Mr. Ruskin attended and spoke at the meetings of the Eyre Defence Fund, to which Mr. Carlyle (see note at the end of this letter) gave his warm support. Amongst those who most strongly deprecated the course taken by Governor Eyre were, as this letter implies, Mr. John Stuart Mill (Chairman of the Jamaica Committee) and Mr. Thomas Hughes.

[20] Signed by 273 persons resident in and near Huddersfield. (Daily Telegraph, December 19, 1865.)

[21] Mr. Mill had been recently returned for Westminster, and Mr. Hughes for Lambeth.

[22] The present king of Greece was only eighteen years of age when, after the protocol of England, Russia, and France on the preceding day, he accepted, June 6, 1863, the crown of Greece.

[23] It is of interest to remark that Mr. Carlyle, in a letter to Mr. Hamilton Hume, Hon. Sec. of the "Eyre Defence Fund" (published in the Daily Telegraph of September 12, 1866), expressed himself as follows: "The clamor raised against Governor Eyre appears to me to be disgraceful to the good sense of England; ... penalty and clamor are not the things this Governor merits from any of us, but honor and thanks, and wise imitation.... The whole weight of my conviction and good wishes is with you." Mr. Carlyle was, with Sir Roderick Murchison, one of the two vice-presidents of the Defence Committee. (See "The History of the Jamaica Case," by G. W. Finlason: London, 1869, p. 369.)

[From "The Daily Telegraph," October 7, 1870.]
THE FRANCO-PRUSSIAN WAR.

To the Editor of "The Daily Telegraph."

Sir: My friends ask me why I speak no word about this war, supposing—like vain friends as they are—that I might have some poor influence of intercession for filigree-work, French clocks, and other tender articles of vertu, felt at this moment to be in grave danger.

But, in the first place, I know that the just Fates will reward no intercession, either for human life or chinaware, until their will has been accomplished upon all of us. In the second, I know also that the German armies will spare what they can, and think they ought, without taking advice of me. In the third, I have said long ago—no one listening—the best I had to say on these matters.

But, after your notice to-day of the escape of M. Edouard Frère,[24] whose gentle power I was, I believe, the first to recognize publicly in England, it is possible that some of your readers may care to look back at what I wrote of modern war four years ago, and to know the aspect it takes to me, now that it has come to pass.

If you will reprint these few following sentences for me from the "Crown of Wild Olive,"[25] I shall be able to-morrow to put what I would add to them briefly enough to claim little space in your columns:

If you have to take away masses of men from all industrial employment—to feed them by the labor of others—to move them, and provide them with destructive machines, varied daily in national rivalship of inventive cost; if you have to ravage the country which you attack—to destroy, for a score of future years, its roads, its woods, its cities, and its harbors; and if, finally, having brought masses of men, counted by hundreds of thousands, face to face, you tear those masses to pieces with jagged shot, and leave fragments of living creatures, countlessly beyond all help of surgery, to starve and parch, through days of torture, down into clots of clay—what book of accounts shall record the cost of your work—what book of judgment sentence the guilt of it?

That, I say, is modern war—scientific war—chemical and mechanical war—worse even than the savage's poisoned arrow. And yet you will tell me, perhaps, that any other war than this is impossible now. It may be so; the progress of science cannot, perhaps, be otherwise registered than by new facilities of destruction; and the brotherly love of our enlarging Christianity be only proved by multiplication of murder.

But the wonder has always been great to me that heroism has never been supposed consistent with the practice of supplying people with food, or clothes, but only with that of quartering one's self upon them for food, and stripping them of their clothes. Spoiling of armor is an heroic deed in all ages; but the selling of clothes, old or new, has never taken any color of magnanimity. Yet one does not see why feeding the hungry and clothing the naked should ever become base businesses even when engaged in on a large scale. If one could contrive to attach the notion of conquest to them anyhow? so that, supposing there were anywhere an obstinate race, who refused to be comforted, one might take some pride in giving them compulsory comfort, and, as it were, "occupying a country" with one's gifts, instead of one's armies? If one could only consider it as much a victory to get a barren field sown as to get an eared field stripped; and contend who should build villages, instead of who should "carry" them? Are not all forms of heroism conceivable in doing these serviceable deeds? You doubt who is strongest? It might be ascertained by push of spade as well as push of sword. Who is wisest? There are witty things to be thought of in planning other business than campaigns. Who is bravest? There are always the elements to fight with, stronger than men; and nearly as merciless.

And, then, observe farther, this true power, the power of saving, depends neither on multitude of men, nor on extent of territory. We are continually assuming that nations become strong according to their numbers. They indeed become so, if those numbers can be made of one mind. But how are you sure you can stay them in one mind, and keep them from having north and south minds? Grant them unanimous, how know you they will be unanimous in right? If they are unanimous in wrong, the more they are, essentially the weaker they are. Or, suppose that they can neither be of one mind, nor of two minds, but can only be of no mind? Suppose they are a mere helpless mob, tottering into precipitant catastrophe, like a wagon-load of stones when the wheel comes off? Dangerous enough for their neighbors certainly, but not "powerful."

Neither does strength depend on extent of territory, any more than upon number of population. Take up your masses, put the cluster of the British Isles beside the mass of South America, and then consider whether any race of men need consider how much ground they stand upon. The strength is in the men, and in their unity and virtue, not in their standing-room. A little group of wise hearts is better than a wilderness full of fools; and only that nation gains true territory which gains itself.

I am, Sir, your faithful servant,
J. Ruskin.
Denmark Hill, S.E., Oct. 6.

FOOTNOTES:

[24] M. Edouard Frère and Mdlle. Rosa Bonheur were allowed to leave Paris and pass the lines of the Prussian army after the blockade of the French capital had been begun. For Mr. Ruskin's early recognition of M. Frère's power, see the "Academy Notes," No. II. (1856), p. 47, where some "cottage studies" are spoken of as "quite unequalled in sincerity and truth of conception, though somewhat dimly painted;"—No. III. (1857), p. 58, where his pictures are said to "unite the depth of Wordsworth, the grace of Reynolds, and the holiness of Angelico;"—and No. IV. (1858), p. 33, where this last expression of praise is emphasized and at some length explained.

[25] See for the first two paragraphs of extracts following pp. [170], [171] of the original, and §§ 102-3 of the 1873 edition of the "Crown of Wild Olive;" for the third paragraph, pp. 116-118, and § 74; and for the last two paragraphs, pp. 186, 187, and §§ 113, 114, respectively, of those two editions.

[From "The Daily Telegraph," October 8, 1870.]
THE FRANCO-PRUSSIAN WAR.

To the Editor of "The Daily Telegraph."

Sir: As I am always blamed if I approach my subject on any but its picturesque side, it is well for me that in to-day's Times I find it announced that at Strasburg the Picture Gallery—with the pictures in it?—the Library—with the books in it?—and the Theatre, with certainly two hundred persons in it, have been burnt to the ground under an auxiliary cannonade, the flames at night being "a tempting target." It is true that in your columns I find the consolatory news that the Parisians are repairing those losses by casting a bronze Strasburg;[26] but if, as a poor art professor, I may venture an opinion, I would fain suggest to them that if their own picture gallery, with the pictures and bits of marble in it—Venus of Melos and the like—and their own Library—Royal, Impériale, Nationale, or whatever they now call it—should presently become tempting targets also by the light of their own flames, the casting of a bronze Paris, in even the most imposing of attitudes, will scarcely redeem their loss, were it but to the admiring eyes of Paris herself.

There is yet another letter in the Times[27] of more importance than the one from Strasburg. It is headed, "The Difficulties of Neutrality," dated Bonn, and anticipates part of what I was going to say; for the rest, the lessons of the war, as I read them, are briefly these.

As to its cause, neither the French nation nor their Emperor brought on war by any present will of their own. Neither of them were capable of a will at all—far less of executing it. The nation has since declared, by submission, with acclaim, to a change of Government which for the time renders all political treaty with it practically impossible, that during the last twenty years it has been deceived or subdued into obedience to a man for whom it had no respect, and who had no hereditary claim to the throne. What "will" or responsibility of action can be expected from a nation which confesses this of itself? On the other hand, the Emperor, be his motives never so selfish, could only have hoped to save his dynasty by compliance with the passions of a populace which he knew would overthrow it in the first hour of their mortification. It is in these vain passions and the falsehoods on which they have fed that we must look for the deep roots of all this misery. Since the days of the First Empire, no cottage in France has been without its Napoleonic picture and legend, fostering one and the same faith in the heart of every peasant boy, that there is no glory but in battle; and since the founding of the Second Empire no street of any city has risen into its foolish magnificence without collateral proclamation that there was no pleasure but in vice.

Then, secondly, for the actual question of the war: it is a simple and testing struggle between pure Republicanism on the one side, expressed in the most exquisite, finished, and exemplary anarchy, yet achieved under—earth—and one of the truest Monarchies and schools of honor and obedience yet organized under heaven. And the secret of its strength, we have to note, is essentially pacific; for all the wars of the Great Friedrich would have passed away resultless—as great wars usually do—had it not been for this pregnant fact at the end of them: "All his artillery horses are parted into plough-teams, and given to those who otherwise can get none" (Carlyle, vol. vi., first edition, p. 350)—that 21st book on the repair of Prussia being of extant literature the most important piece for us to read and digest in these days of "raising the poor without gifts"—never asking who first let them fall—and of turning workmen out of dockyards, without any consciousness that, of all the stores in the yard, the men were exactly the most precious. You expressed, Sir, in your article on the loss of the Captain,[28] a feeling common, I suppose, for once, to all of us, that the principal loss was not the iron of the ship, but the five hundred men in her. Perhaps, had she been of gold instead of iron plate, public mourning might have inclined itself to the side of the metal. But how if the whole British public should be itself at this instant afloat in a captain-less Captain, built of somewhat dirty yet substantial gold, and in extremest peril of turning bottom upwards? Which will be the end, indeed, unless the said public quickly perceive that their hope must be, not in docks nor ships, but in men. They, and they only, are our guarantee for territory. Prussia herself seems as simple as the rest of us in her talk of "guarantees." Alsace and Lorraine, if dishonestly come by, may be honestly retaken; but if for "guarantee," why these only? Why not Burgundy and Anjou—Auvergne and the Limousin? Let France lose what she may, if she can but find a Charles and Roland among her children, she will recover her empire, though she had been beaten back to the Brêche; and if she find them not, Germany has all the guarantee she needs in her own name, and in her own right hand.

Let her look to it, now, that her fame be not sullied. She is pressing her victory too far—dangerously far, as uselessly. The Nemesis of battle may indeed be near her; greater glory she cannot win by the taking of Paris, nor the overrunning of provinces—she only prolongs suffering, redoubles death, extends loss, incalculable and irremediable. But let her now give unconditional armistice, and offer terms that France can accept with honor, and she will bear such rank among the nations as never yet shone on Christian history.

For us, we ought to help France now, if we ever did anything, but of course there remains for us only neutrality—selling of coke, and silence (if we have grace enough left to keep it). I have only broken mine to say that I am ashamed to speak as being one of a nation regardless of its honor alike in trade and policy; poor, yet not careful to keep even the treasure of probity—and rich, without being able to afford itself the luxury of courage.

I am, Sir, your faithful servant,
J. Ruskin.
Oct. 7.

FOOTNOTES:

[26] The Daily Telegraph of Oct. 7 contained amongst its Paris news that of the decision of the Government of National Defence to cast a statue of the city of Strasburg in bronze, in memory of its "heroic resistance to the enemy during a murderous siege of fifty days."

[27] This letter was signed "W. C. P.," who, after stating himself to be an English resident in Germany, proceeded to lament the changed position of England in the opinion of foreign nations, and especially in that of the Germans, who no longer spoke of her, as formerly, "with affectionate admiration or even envious respect." "And I must confess," concluded the letter, "that I find it difficult to answer them; for it seems to me that we have already good reason to say, in reference to the present struggle, 'All is lost save money.'"—Times, October 7, 1870.

[28] The turret ship "Captain" foundered off Cape Finisterre on September 7, 1870. For the articles alluded to, see the Daily Telegraph of September 12 and following days.

[From "Fraser's Magazine," July, 1876, pp. 121-123.]
MODERN WARFARE.

To the Editor of "Fraser's Magazine."

Sir: The article on modern warfare in your last June number[29] contains statements of so great importance to public interest, that I do not hesitate to ask you to spare me space for a question or two respecting it, which by answering, your contributor may make the facts he has brought forward more valuable for practical issues.

The statistics[30] given in the second column of page 695, on which P. S. C. rests his "incontestable" conclusion that "battles are less sanguinary than they were," are incomplete in this vital respect, that they furnish us only with the proportion, and not with the total number, of combatants slain. A barricade fight between a mob of rioters a thousand strong, and a battery of artillery, in which fifty reformers get shot, is not "less sanguinary" than a street quarrel between three topers, of whom one gets knocked on the head with a pewter pot: though no more than the twentieth part of the forces on one side fall in the first case, and a third of the total forces engaged, in the second. Nor could it be proved by the exhibition of these proportions of loss, that the substitution of explosive shells, as offensive weapons, for pewter pots, rendered wounds less painful, or war more humane.

Now, the practical difference between ancient and modern war, as carried on by civilized nations, is, broadly, of this kind. Formerly, the persons who had quarrelled settled their differences by the strength of their own arms, at the head of their retainers, with comparatively inexpensive weapons such as they could conveniently wield; weapons which they had paid for out of their own pockets, and with which they struck only the people they meant to strike: while, nowadays, persons who quarrel fight at a distance, with mechanical apparatus, for the manufacture of which they have taxed the public, and which will kill anybody who happens to be in the way; gathering at the same time, to put into the way of them, as large a quantity of senseless and innocent mob as can be beguiled, or compelled, to the slaughter. So that, in the words of your contributor, "Modern armies are not now small fractions of the population whence they are drawn; they represent—in fact are—whole nations in arms." I have only to correct this somewhat vague and rhetorical statement by pointing out that the persons in arms, led out for mutual destruction, are by no means "the whole nation" on either side, but only the individuals of it who are able-bodied, honest, and brave, selected to be shot, from among its invalids, rogues, and cowards.

The deficiencies in your contributor's evidence as to the totality of loss do not, however, invalidate his conclusion that, out of given numbers engaged, the mitrailleuse kills fewer than the musket.[31] It is, nevertheless, a very startling conclusion, and one not to be accepted without closer examination of the statistics on which it is based. I will, therefore, tabulate them in a simpler form, which the eye can catch easily, omitting only one or two instances which add nothing to the force of the evidence.

In the six under-named battles of bygone times, there fell, according to your contributor's estimate, out of the total combatants—

while in the under-named five recent battles the proportion of loss was—

Now, there is a very important difference in the character of the battles named in these two lists. Every one of the first six was decisive, and both sides knew that it must be so when the engagement began, and did their best to win. But Königgratz was only decisive by sudden and appalling demonstration of the power of a new weapon. Solferino was only half fought, and not followed up because the French Emperor had exhausted his corps d'élite at Magenta, and could not (or, at least, so it is reported) depend on his troops of the line. Worth was an experiment; Sedan a discouraged ruin; Gravelotte was, I believe, well contested, but I do not know on what extent of the line, and we have no real evidence as to the power of modern mechanics for death, until the proportions are calculated, not from the numbers engaged, but from those under fire for equal times. Now, in all the upper list of battles, probably every man of both armies was under fire, and some of the regiments under fire for half the day; while in the lower list of battles, only fragments of the line were hotly engaged, and the dispute on any point reaching its intensity would be ended in half an hour.

That the close of contest is so rapid may indeed be one of the conditions of improvement in our military system alleged by your correspondent; and the statistics he has brought forward do indeed clearly prove one of two things—either that modern weapons do not kill, or that modern soldiers do not fight as effectually as in old times. I do not know if this is thought a desirable change in military circles; but I, as a poor civilian, beg to express my strong objection to being taxed six times over what I used to be, either for the equipment of soldiers who rarely fight, or the manufacture of weapons which rarely kill. It may be perfectly true that our last cruise on the Baltic was "less sanguinary" than that which concluded in Copenhagen. But we shook hands with the Danes after fighting them, and the differences between us were ended: while our expensive contemplation of the defences of Cronstadt leaves us still in daily dread of an inspection by the Russian of those of Calcutta.

It is true that the ingenuity of our inventors is far from being exhausted, and that in a few years more we may be able to destroy a regiment round a corner and bombard a fleet over the horizon; but I believe the effective result of these crowning scientific successes will only be to confirm the at present partial impression on the minds of military and naval officers, that their duty is rather to take care of their weapons than to use them. "England will expect" of her generals and admirals to maintain a dignified moral position as far as possible out of the enemy's sight: and in a perfectly scientific era of seamanship we shall see two adverse fleets affected by a constant law of mutual repulsion at distances of two or three hundred miles; while in either squadron, an occasional collision between the leading ships, or inexplicable foundering of the last improved ones, will make these prudential manœuvres on the whole as destructive of the force, and about ten times more costly to the pocket, of the nation, than the ancient, and, perhaps, more honorable tactics of poorly-armed pugnacity.

There is, however, one point touched upon in P. S. C.'s letter, to me the most interesting of all, with respect to which the data for accurate comparison of our former and present systems are especially desirable, though it never seems to have occurred to your correspondent to collect them—the estimates, namely, of the relative destruction of civil property.

Of wilful destruction, I most thankfully acknowledge the cessation in Christian warfare; and in the great change between the day of the sack of Magdeburg and that of the march into Paris, recognize a true sign of the approach of the reign of national peace. But of inevitable destruction—of loss inflicted on the peasant by the merely imperative requirements and operations of contending armies—it will materially hasten the advent of such peace, if we ascertain the increasing pressure during our nominally mollified and merciful war. The agricultural losses sustained by France in one year are estimated by your correspondent at one hundred and seventy millions of pounds. Let him add to this sum the agricultural loss necessitated in the same year throughout Germany, through the withdrawal of capital from productive industry, for the maintenance of her armies; and of labor from it by their composition; and, for third item, add the total cost of weapons, horses, and ammunition on both sides; and let him then inform us whether the cost, thus summed, of a year's actual war between two European States, is supposed by military authorities to be fairly representative of that which the settlement of political dispute between any two such Powers, with modern instruments of battle, will on an average, in future, involve. If so, I will only venture further to suggest that the nations minded thus to try their quarrel should at least raise the stakes for their match before they make the ring, instead of drawing bills for them upon futurity. For that the money-lenders whose pockets are filled, while everybody else's are emptied, by recent military finance, should occultly exercise irresistible influence, not only on the development of our—according to your contributor—daily more harmless armaments, but also on the deliberation of Cabinets, and passions of the populace, is inevitable under present circumstances; and the exercise of such influence, however advantageous to contractors and projectors, can scarcely be held consistent either with the honor of a Senate or the safety of a State.

I am, Sir,
Your faithful servant,
J. Ruskin.

P.S.—I wish I could get a broad approximate estimate of the expenditure in money, and loss of men by France and Prussia in the respective years of Jena and Sedan, and by France and Austria in the respective years of Arcola and Solferino.

FOOTNOTES:

[29] "Remarks on Modern Warfare." By a Military Officer. The article was signed "P. S. C."

[30] See the tables given in this letter (pp. [30] and [31]).

[31] "The proportion of killed and wounded," wrote P. S. C., "was far greater with the old-fashioned weapons than it is at the present day."

LETTERS ON POLITICAL ECONOMY.

The Depreciation of Gold. 1863.
The Law of Supply and Demand. 1864.
(Three letters: October 26 and 29, and November 2.)
Mr. Ruskin and Professor Hodgson. 1873.
(Two letters: November 8 and 15.)
Strikes v. Arbitration. 1865.
Work and Wages. 1865.
(Five letters: April 20, 22, and 29, and May 4 and 20.)
The Standard of Wages. 1867.
How the Rich Spend their Money. 1873.
(Three letters: January 23, 28, and 30.)
Commercial Morality. 1875.
The Definition of Wealth. 1875.
The Principles of Property. 1877.
On Coöperation. (Two letters.) 1879-80.

LETTERS ON POLITICAL ECONOMY.

[From "The Times," October 8, 1863.]
THE DEPRECIATION OF GOLD.

To the Editor of "The Times."

Sir: Being out of the way of my letters, I did not, till now, see your excellent article of the 23d September on the depreciation of gold.[32] Will you allow me, thus late, a very few words in confirmation of your statement of the insufficiency of the evidence hitherto offered on that subject?

The market value of "a pound" depends less on the supply of gold than on the extravagance or economy of the persons holding documentary currency (that is to say, claim to goods). Suppose, for instance, that I hold stock to the value of £500 a year;—if I live on a hundred a year, and lay by four hundred, I (for the time) keep down the prices of all goods to the distributed amount of £400 a year, or, in other words, neutralize the effect on the market of 400 pounds in gold imported annually from Australia. If, instead of laying by this sum in paper, I choose to throw it into bullion (whether gold-plate or coin does not matter), I not only keep down the price of goods, but raise the price of gold as a commodity, and neutralize 800 pounds' worth of imported gold. But if I annually spend my entire 500 (unproductively) I annually raise the price of goods by that amount, and neutralize a correspondent diminution in the supply of gold. If I spend my 500 productively, that is to say, so as to produce as much as, or more than I consume, I either leave the market as I find it, or by the excess of production increase the value of gold.

Similarly, whatever I lay by will, as it is ultimately spent by my successors, productively or unproductively, in that degree (cœteris paribus) increase or lower the value of gold. These agencies of daily economy have so much more power over the market than the supply from the mine that no statistics of which we are yet in possession are (at least in their existing form) sufficient to prove the dependence of any given phenomena of the market on the rate of metallic supply. The destruction of property in the American war and our European amusements in the manufacture of monster guns and steel "backings" lower the value of money far more surely and fatally than an increased supply of bullion, for the latter may very possibly excite parallel force of productive industry.

But the lowered value of money is often (and this is a very curious case of economical back current) indicated, not so much by a rise in the price of goods, as by a fall in that of labor. The household lives as comfortably as it did on a hundred a year, but the master has to work half as hard again to get it. This increase of toil is to an active nation often a kind of play; men go into it as into a violent game; fathers of families die quicker, and the gates of orphan asylums are choked with applicants; distress and crime spread and fester through a thousand silent channels; but there is no commercial or elementary convulsion; no chasm opens into the abyss through the London clay; no gilded victim is asked of the Guards; the Stock-Exchange falls into no hysterics; and the old lady of Threadneedle Street does not so much as ask for "My fan, Peter."

I am, Sir, your obedient servant,
J. Ruskin.
Chamounix, Oct. 2.

FOOTNOTES:

[32] See one of the leading articles in The Times of Sept. 23, 1863, upon the then panic as to the depreciation of gold, excited by the considerable fresh discoveries of the precious metal in California and Australia.

[From "The Daily Telegraph," October 28, 1864.]
THE LAW OF SUPPLY AND DEMAND.

To the Editor of "The Daily Telegraph."

Sir: In your valuable article of to-day on the strike of the colliers, while you lay down the true and just law[33] respecting all such combinations, you take your stand, in the outset, on a maxim of political economy, which, however trite, stands yet—if I am not deceived—in need of much examination and qualification. "Labor," you say, like every other vendible commodity, "depends for its value on the relation of supply to demand." But, Sir, might it not be asked by any simple and practical person, who had heard this assertion for the first time—as I hope all practical persons will some day hear it for the last time—"Yes; but what does demand depend upon, and what does supply depend upon?" If, for instance, all death-beds came to resemble that so forcibly depicted in your next following article, and, in consequence, the demand for gin were unlimitedly increased towards the close of human life,[34] would this demand necessitate, or indicate, a relative increase in the "value" of gin as a necessary article of national wealth, and liquid foundation of national prosperity? Or might we not advisably make some steady and generally understood distinction between the terms "value" and "price," and determine at once whether there be, or be not, such a thing as intrinsic "value" or goodness in some things, and as intrinsic un-value or badness in other things; and as value extrinsic, or according to use, in all things? and whether a demand for intrinsically good things, and a corresponding knowledge of their use, be not conditions likely, on the whole, to tend towards national wealth? and whether a demand for intrinsically bad things, and relative experience in their use, be not conditions likely to lead to quite the reverse of national wealth, in exact proportion to the facility of the supply of the said bad things? I should be entirely grateful to you, Sir, or to any of your correspondents, if you or they would answer these short questions clearly for me.

I am, Sir, yours, etc.,
J. Ruskin.[35]
Denmark Hill, Oct. 26.

FOOTNOTES:

[33] The strike was amongst the South Staffordshire colliers: the law laid down in the article that of free trade.

[34] Upon the then recent and miserable death of an Irish gentleman, who had been an habitual hard-drinker.

[35] To this letter an answer (Daily Telegraph, October 29) was attempted by "Economist," writing from "Lloyds, Oct. 28," stating that "Value in political economy means exchangeable value, not intrinsic value." The rest of his letter is given in Mr. Ruskin's reply to it.

[From "The Daily Telegraph," October 31, 1864.]
THE LAW OF SUPPLY AND DEMAND.

To the Editor of "The Daily Telegraph."

Sir: I am grateful to your correspondent "Economist" for trying his hand on me, and will be a docile pupil; but I hope his hand is not quite untried hitherto, for it would waste your space, and my time, and your readers' patience, if he taught me what I had afterwards to unlearn. But I think none of these will be wasted if he answers my questions clearly; there are, I am sure, many innocent persons who, like myself, will be glad of the information.

1. He tells me, then, in the outset, "The intrinsic value of commodities is a question outside political economy."

Is that an axiom for all political economists? and may I put it down for future reference? I particularly wish to be assured of this.

2. Assuming, for the present, that I may so set it down, and that exchangeable value is the only subject of politico-economical inquiry, I proceed to my informant's following statement:

"The" (question) "of intrinsic value belongs to the domain of philosophy, morals, or statecraft. The intrinsic value of anything depends on its qualities; the exchangeable value depends on how much there is of it, and how much people want it."

(This "want" of it never, of course, in anywise depending on its qualities.)

Μανθανω. Accordingly, in that ancient and rashly-speculative adage, "Venture a sprat to catch a herring," it is only assumed that people will always want herrings rather than sprats, and that there will always be fewer of them. No reference is involved, according to economists, to the relative sizes of a sprat and herring.

Farther: Were a fashionable doctor to write an essay on sprats, and increase their display at West-end tables to that extent that unseasonable sprats became worth a guinea a head, while herrings remained at the old nursery rate of one and a half for three-halfpence, would my "recognition" of the value of sprats in paying a guinea for one enable me to dine off it better than I should off that mysterious eleven-penny worth of herring? Or to take a more elevated instance. There is now on my room wall a water-color drawing, which was once bought for £30, and for which any dealer would to-morrow give me £300. The drawing is intrinsically worth about one-tenth of what it was when bought for £30, the sky having faded out of it, and many colors having changed elsewhere. But men's minds have changed like the colors, and Lord A. or Sir John B. are now ready to give me £300 instead of £30 for it.

Now, I want to know what it matters to "Economist," or to the Economical Society he (as I understand) represents, or to the British nation generally, whether Lord A. has the bit of colored paper and I the £300, or Lord A. the £300 and I the bit of paper. The pounds are there, and the paper is there: what does it nationally matter which of us have which?

Farther: What does it nationally matter whether Lord A. gives me £30 or £300 on the exchange? (Mind, I do not say it does not matter—I only want "Economist" to tell me if it does, and how it does.) In one case my lord has £270 more to spend; in the other I have. What does it signify which of us has?

Farther: To us, the exchangers, of what use is "Economist's" information that the rate of exchange depends on the "demand and supply" of colored paper and pounds? No ghost need come from the grave to tell us that. But if any economical ghost would tell my lord how to get more pounds, or me how to get more drawings, it might be to the purpose.

But yet farther, passing from specialties to generals:

Let the entire property of the nation be enumerated in the several articles of which it consists—a, b, c, d, etc.; we will say only three, for convenience sake. Then all the national property consists of a + b + c.

I ask, first, what a is worth.

"Economist" answers (suppose) 2 b.

I ask, next, what b is worth.

"Economist" answers (suppose) 3 c.

I ask, next, what c is worth.

"Economist" answers—a/b.

Many thanks. That is certainly Cocker's view of it.

I ask, finally, What is it all worth?

"Economist" answers, 1⅔ a, or 3⅓ b, or 10 c.

Thanks again. But now, intrinsic value not being in "Economist's" domain, but—if I chance to be a philosopher—in mine, I may any day discover any given intrinsic value to belong to any one of these articles.

Suppose I find, for instance, the value of c to be intrinsically zero, then the entire national property = 10c = intrinsically 0.

Shall I be justified in this conclusion?

3. In relation to the question of strikes, the difficulty, you told me yourself, Mr. Editor[36] (and doubtless "Economist" will tell me also), depends simply on supply and demand: that is to say, on an under-supply of wages and an over-supply of laborers. Profoundest thanks again; but I, poor blundering, thick-headed collier, feel disposed further to ask, "On what do this underness and overness of supply depend?" Have they any remote connection with marriage, or with improvidence, or with avarice, or with accumulativeness, or any other human weaknesses out of the ken of political economy? And, whatever they arise from, how are they to be dealt with? It appears to me, poor simple collier, that the shortest way of dealing with this "darned" supply of laborers will be by knocking some of them down, or otherwise disabling them for the present. Why is this mode of regulating the supply interdicted to me? and what have Economists to do with the morality of any proceeding whatever? and, in the name of economy generally, what else can I do?[37]

I am, Sir, yours, etc.,
J. Ruskin.
Denmark Hill, Oct. 29. [Monday.]

FOOTNOTES:

[36] See ante, p. [39].

[37] "Economist" does not seem to have continued his argument. A reply to this letter was however attempted by "John Plummer," writing from Kettering, and dealing with the over-supply of laborers and under-supply of wages, and Mr. Ruskin's possible views on the matter. The next letter ended the correspondence.

[From "The Daily Telegraph," November 8, 1864.]
THE LAW OF SUPPLY AND DEMAND.

To the Editor of "The Daily Telegraph."

Sir: Having, unfortunately, occupation enough in my own business for all hours of the day, I cannot undertake to reply to the general correspondence which might, in large supply to my limited demand, propose itself in your columns. If my first respondent, "Economist," or any other person learned in his science, will give me direct answers to the direct questions asked in my Monday's letter, I may, with your permission, follow the points at issue farther; if not, I will trouble you no more. Your correspondent of to-day, Mr. Plummer, may ascertain whether I confuse the terms "value" and "price" by reference to the bottom of the second column in page 787 of "Fraser's Magazine" for June, 1862. Of my opinions respecting the treatment of the working classes he knows nothing, and can guess nothing.[38]

I am, Sir, yours, etc.,
J. Ruskin.
Denmark Hill, Nov. 2.

FOOTNOTES:

[38] In the "Essays on Political Economy," since reprinted as "Munera Pulveris." See p. 10, § 12 of that book, where the passage is printed in italics: "The reader must, by anticipation, be warned against confusing value with cost, or with price. Value is the life-giving power of anything; cost, the quantity of labor required to produce it; price, the quantity of labor which its possessor will take in exchange for it."

[From "The Scotsman," November 10, 1873.]
MR. RUSKIN AND PROFESSOR HODGSON.
CORPUS CHRISTI COLLEGE, OXFORD,
Nov. 8th, 1873.

To the Editor of "The Scotsman."

Sir: In your impression of the 6th inst. I find a report of a lecture delivered by Professor Hodgson in the University of Edinburgh on the subject of "Supply and Demand," in which the Professor speaks of my "denunciations" of the principles he had expounded. Permit me, in a matter respecting which accuracy is of more importance to others than to myself, to correct the Professor's expression. I have never "denounced" the principles expounded by the Professor. I have simply stated that no such principles exist; that no "law of supply and demand," as expounded by Professor Hodgson and modern economists, ever did or can exist.

Professor Hodgson, as reported in your columns, states that "demand regulates supply." He does not appear to entertain the incomparably more important economical question, "What regulates demand?" But without pressing upon him that first question of all, I am content absolutely to contradict and to challenge him before the University of Edinburgh to maintain his statement that "demand regulates supply," and together with it (if he has ventured to advance it) the correlative proposition, "supply regulates demand."

A. Demand does not regulate supply.

For instance—there is at this moment a larger demand for champagne wine in England and Scotland than there was ten years ago; and a much more limited supply of champagne wine.

B. Supply does not regulate demand.

For instance—I can name many districts in Scotland where the supply of pure water is larger than in other namable localities, but where the inhabitants drink less water and more whiskey than in other namable localities.

I do not therefore denounce the so-called law of supply and demand, but I absolutely deny the existence of such law; and I do in the very strongest terms denounce the assertion of the existence of such a law before the University of Edinburgh as disgraceful both to its assertor and to the University, unless immediate steps be taken to define, in scientific terms, the limitations under which such statement is to be understood.

I am, etc.,
John Ruskin.[39]

FOOTNOTES:

[39] To this letter Professor Hodgson replied by one printed in the Scotsman of November 14.

[From "The Scotsman," November 18, 1873]
MR. RUSKIN AND PROFESSOR HODGSON.
Oxford, November 15, 1873.

To the Editor of "The Scotsman."

Sir: For Professor Hodgson's "undue encroachments on your space and his own time," I leave you to answer to your readers, and the Professor to console his class. To his criticisms on my language and temper I bow, their defence being irrelevant to the matter in hand. Of his harmless confusion of the word "correlative" with the word "consequent" I take no notice; and his promise of a sifting examination of my economic teaching I anticipate with grateful awe.[40]

But there is one sentence in his letter of real significance, and to that alone I reply. The Professor ventured (he says) to suggest that possibly I with others "believe that economists confused existing demand with wise and beneficial demand, and existing supply with wise and beneficial supply."

I do believe this. I have written all my books on political economy in such belief. And the entire gist of them is the assertion that a real law of relation holds between the non-existent wise demand and the non-existent beneficial supply, but that no real law of relation holds between the existent foolish demand and the existent mischievous supply.

That is to say (to follow Professor Hodgson with greater accuracy into his lunar illustrations), if you ask for the moon, it does not follow that you will get it; nor is your satisfaction more secure if you ask for sixpence from a Poor-Law guardian; but if you limit your demand to an honest penny, and endeavor to turn it by honest work, the divine law of supply will, in the plurality of cases, answer that rational and therefore divine demand.

Now, Professor Hodgson's statement, as reported in your columns, was that "demand regulates supply." If his assertion, in his lecture, was the qualified one, or that "wise demand regulates beneficial supply," your reporter is much to be blamed, the Professor's class profoundly to be congratulated, and this correspondence is at an end; while I look forward with deepest interest to the necessary elucidations by the Professor of the nature of wisdom and benefit; neither of these ideas having been yet familiar ones in common economical treatises. But I wrote under the impression that the Professor dealt hitherto, as it has been the boast of economists to deal, with things existent, and not theoretical (and assuredly the practical men of this country expect their children to be instructed by him in the laws which govern existing things); and it is therefore only in the name of your practical readers that I challenged him, and to-day repeat my challenge, in terms from which I trust he will not again attempt to escape by circumambient criticism of my works,[41] to define, in scientific terms, the limits under which his general statement that "supply regulates demand" is to be understood. That is to say, whether he, as Professor of Political Economy, is about to explain the relations (A) of rational and satiable demand with beneficial and benevolently-directly supply; or (B) of irrational and insatiable demand with mischievous and malevolently-directed supply; or (C) of a demand of which he cannot explain the character with a supply of which he cannot predict the consequence?

I am, etc.,
J. Ruskin.

FOOTNOTES:

[40] "I hereby promise Mr. Ruskin that ere very many months are over he shall have in print a sifting examination of his economic teaching." I do not find, however, that Professor Hodgson fulfilled his promise.

[41] Professor Hodgson's letter had quoted, with criticism, several passages from "Fors Clavigera," "Munera Pulveris," and "Time and Tide."

[From "The Pall Mall Gazette," April 18, 1865.]
STRIKES v. ARBITRATION.

To the Editor of "The Pall Mall Gazette."

Sir: I read your Gazette so attentively that I am always falling into arrears, and have only to-day arrived at your last week's articles on strikes, arbitration, etc., which afford me the greatest satisfaction, but nevertheless embarrass me somewhat. Will you permit me to ask for a word or two of further elucidation?

I am an entirely selfish person, and having the means of indulging myself (in moderation), should, I believe, have led a comfortable life, had it not been for occasional fits and twinges of conscience, to which I inherit some family predisposition, and from which I suffer great uneasiness in cloudy weather. Articles like yours of Wednesday,[42] on the proper attention to one's own interests, are very comforting and helpful to me; but, as I said, there are yet some points in them I do not understand.

Of course it is right to arrange all one's business with reference to one's own interest; but what will the practical difference be ultimately between such arrangement and the old and simple conscientious one? In those bygone days, I remember, one endeavored, with such rough estimate as could be quickly made, to give one's Roland for one's Oliver; if a man did you a service, you tried in return to do as much for him; if he broke your head, you broke his, shook hands, and were both the better for it. Contrariwise, on this modern principle of self-interest, I understand very well that if a man does me a service, I am always to do the least I can in return for it; but I don't see how I am always to get more out of him than he gets out of me. I dislike any references to abstract justice as much as you do, but I cannot see my way to keeping this injustice always in my own favor; and if I cannot, it seems to me the matter may as well be settled at first, as it must come to be settled at last, in that disagreeably just way.

Thus, for instance, in producing a piece of iron for the market, one man digs it, another smelts it, another puddles it, and I sell it. We get so much between us four; and I suppose your conscientious people would say that the division of the pay should have some reference to the hardness of the work, and the time spent in it. It is true that by encouraging the diggers and puddlers to spend all they get in drink, and by turning them off as soon as I hear they are laying by money, it may yet be possible to get them for some time to take less than I suppose they should have; but I cannot hide from myself that the men are beginning to understand the game a little themselves; and if they should, with the help of those confounded—(I beg pardon! I forgot that one does not print such expressions in Pall Mall)—education-mongers, learn to be men, and to look after their own business as I do mine, what am I to do? Even at present I don't feel easy in telling them that I ought to have more money than they because I know better how to spend it, for even this involves a distant reference to notions of propriety and principle which I would gladly avoid. Will you kindly tell me what is best to be done (or said)?

I am, Sir, your obliged servant,
John Ruskin.
Easter Monday, 1865.

FOOTNOTES:

[42] The articles alluded to were, one upon "Strikes and Arbitration Courts," in the Gazette of Wednesday, the 12th, and the one on "The Times on Trade Arbitration," in the Gazette of Thursday, the 13th. The former dealt with the proposal to decide questions raised by strikes by reference to courts of arbitration. Amongst the sentences contained in it, and alluded to by Mr. Ruskin, were the following: "Phrases about the 'principles of right and justice' are always suspicious and generally fallacious." "The rate of wages is determined exclusively by self-interest." "There is no such thing as a 'fair' rate of wages or a 'just' rate of wages."

[From "The Pall Mall Gazette," April 21, 1865.]
WORK AND WAGES.

To the Editor of "The Pall Mall Gazette."

Sir: I am not usually unready for controversy, but I dislike it in spring, as I do the east wind (pace Mr. Kingsley), and I both regret having given occasion to the only dull leader which has yet[43] appeared in the Pall Mall Gazette, and the necessity I am involved in of dissecting the same, instead of a violet, on which I was about this morning to begin operations.

But I see, Sir, that you mean fairly, and that you have careful thinkers and writers on your staff. And I will accept your battle, if you will fight with short swords, which is clearly your interest, for such another article would sink the Gazette; and mine, for I have no time to answer speculations on what you writers suppose my opinions may be, "if we understand" them.

You shall understand them utterly, as I already understand yours. I will not call yours "fallacies" à priori; you shall not call mine so. I will not tell you of your "unconscious" meanings; you shall not tell me of mine.[44] But I will ask you the plainest questions, and make to you the plainest answers my English will admit of, on one point at a time only, expecting you also to ask or answer as briefly, without divergence or deprecation. And twenty lines will always contain all I would say, at any intervals of time you choose.

For example: I said I must "dissect" your leader, meaning that I should have to take a piece of it, as I would of my flower, and deal with that first; then with its sequences.

I take this sentence then: "He (Mr. R.) seems to think that apart from the question of the powers of the parties, there is some such thing as a just rate of wages. He seems to be under the impression that the wages ought to be proportioned, not to the supply and demand of labor and capital, but 'to the hardship of the work and the time spent in it.'"

Yes, Sir, I am decisively under that impression—as decisively as ever Greek coin was under its impression. You will beat me out of all shape, if you can beat me out of this. Will you join issue on it, and are these following statements clear enough for you, either to accept or deny, in as positive terms?—

I. A man should in justice be paid for two hours' work twice as much as for one hour's work, and for n hour's work n times as much, if the effort be similar and continuous.

II. A man should in justice be paid for difficult or dangerous work proportionately more than for easy and safe work, supposing the other conditions of the work similar.

III. (And now look out, for this proposition involves the ultimate principle of all just wages.) If a man does a given quantity of work for me, I am bound in justice to do, or procure to be done, a precisely equal quantity of work for him; and just trade in labor is the exchange of equivalent quantities of labor of different kinds.

If you pause at this word "equivalent," you shall have definition of it in my next letter. I am sure you will in fairness insert this challenge, whether you accept it or decline.

I am, Sir, your obliged servant,
John Ruskin.[45]
Denmark Hill, Thursday, April 20.

FOOTNOTES:

[43] The Gazette was at this time of little more than eight weeks' standing. The dull leader was that in the Gazette of April 19, entitled "Masters and Men," and dealt entirely with Mr. Ruskin's letter on strikes. The "pace Mr. Kingsley" alludes, of course, to his "Ode to the North-East Wind."

[44] The leader had begun by speaking of Mr. Ruskin's previous letter as "embodying fallacies, pernicious in the highest degree," and concluded by remarking how "easily and unconsciously he glided into the true result of his principles."

[45] In reply, the Gazette denied "each of the three propositions to be true," on grounds shown in the quotations given in the following letter.

[From "The Pall Mall Gazette," April 26, 1865.]
WORK AND WAGES.