and rapid development than in any other single epoch in its entire history." In an interview with Von Martens the first Napoleon is reported to have said, " We must have a new law of nations," and the rapid movements of the past fifty years to which Dr. Taylor calls attention in his preface make imperative a restatement of the old law. If they do not call for a " new law " as Napoleon suggested, they at least call for a modification of the traditional system. The text-book of a generation ago is in a sense antiquated, and a new edition can hardly keep it up to date. The classic treatise, of Wheaton has not found an American editor since the six ties, and recent treatises however admirable or commendable they may be in other respects, do not set forth in adequate detail the changes that have come over the world. To take a single specific instance : " A Text book of International Law," says Mr. Holls, "without a careful discussion of The Hague Treaty for the Peaceful Adjustment of Inter national Differences is hereafter quite as un thinkable as a history of English Constitutional Law containing no reference to Magna Charta or the Bill of Rights." And the same great authority goes so far as to term the treaty men tioned, " The Magna Charta of International Law." It is, therefore, with reason that Dr. Taylor, our former minister to Spain and widely and favorably known by his work on the English Constitution, should set himself task of a restate ment and re-examination of the fundamental rules and principles of international law, and the recent publication of his work is in all senses of the word timely. That the author states the law and states it correctly will be admitted by any one who makes even a cursory examination of the book, and the authorities, English and American, as well as Continental, are elaborately cited. But historical precedents, opinions of text-writers and adjudi cated cases are given like weight and impor tance. The view, however, of a distinguished jurist is after all a personal view or at best a dictum, if it is not a digest of authorities, and the mere enumeration of discordant views does not solve a difficulty. It is sometimes necessary to adopt the heroic method with the Gordian knot : to cut away the mass of history and repetition

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in order to substitute a clear-cut statement of one's own, based upon the principle of the thing. This Dr. Taylor does not always do, and it is sometimes difficult to know to what extent he shares the views cited. An example of this may be instanced in the discussion of the effect of extinction on State obligations (pp. 201-205), when a rigid and critical examination of under lying principles would be more illuminating than a mere summary of the weight of authority; for where authority is clearly wrong from a legal point of view, or where authorities differ, the only way is to test the rule in the light of legal theory. History may well show experience and practice, but it does not disclose the fundamental principle, though it may well illustrate or supple ment the principle when found. This failure to distinguish between history and law, leads the author to ascribe, it would seem, undue importance to the Monroe Doctrine. In American diplomatic history its place is great, but Europe, while it takes note of its existence, considers it rather a matter of American policy than as binding upon European States. The ratification of the doctrine at The Hague would seem rather to be an admission that the doctrine is binding on the United States than that it binds Europe. In any case, it certainly seems too early to look upon the doctrine as a source of international law as the author does in part 11, chapter vi. But this is said more in criticism of the method than of the book. Dr. Taylor has chosen to adopt the historical method in treating inter national law and he has, therefore, written a his tory of the development of his subject rather than a treatise on international law. That is, his work is more of an historical treatise than a law treatise. That international law is positive law in the United States, whatever it may be else where, he clearly recognizes, and he likewise states the principle that our courts take judicial notice of it as such (the Scotia, 14 Wallace 170). But the Supreme Court lays down in a recent case, (the Paquete Habana, 175 U.S. 677) that inter national law as such is not binding, but only the international law applicable to our situation, and that the opinions of jurists and commentators as such are not binding upon us. The passage at page 700 deserves quotation, for it shows not