Preface.

A few words will explain that this volume is a collection of the Essays published under the title of “Methods of Social Reform” in The Contemporary Review, and of other papers and addresses on kindred subjects. They extend over a period of fifteen years, and I have given at the commencement of each paper the date at which it was written, as I have thought it better to arrange them as far as I could according to subjects rather than by date. It was my husband's intention to have republished these Essays himself, and with this view he had already revised two of them—“Experimental Legislation and the Drink Traffic,” and “Amusements of the People;” to the latter he had added several new paragraphs. He would, I am sure, have carefully edited and revised the others in the same way, but they are now republished just as they were originally written. The Essay on “The Use and Abuse of Museums” has not before been published. It was chiefly written in 1881, for The Contemporary Review, but was laid aside from the pressure of other work, and I am unable to say the exact time at which it was finished. It still needs the final revision which he would have given before sending it Edition: current; Page: [vi] to Press. The Lecture on “Industrial Partnerships” is referred to by Mr. Jevons in his book on “The State in Relation to Labour,” p. 144, where he says that he sees no reason to alter the opinions expressed in the Lecture in favour of Industrial Partnerships, in spite of the failure of the experimental trials of the system by Messrs. Henry Briggs & Co., Messrs. Fox, Head & Co., and others.