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sometimes affected to despise, Shannon is less indulgent. In his view, Disraeli dealt in gestures because gestures were cheap, and creating the substance of an alternative policy was beyond his capacities. Part III considers the formative elements of a modern society, as they emerged in the 1880s and 1890s; and more attention is given to social and cultural history in this central section than in other parts of the book. Parts IV and V consider 'The Search for Adequate Responses' in the politics of the pre-war generation. 'The Unionist Version' centres round the issue of Imperialism. Dr. Shannon's treatment of 'The Liberal Version' gives us a balanced and up-to-date view of the problems of Liberalism in its last phase of power. Here he postulates 'the duality of profitability and impending bankruptcy' as our framework of interpretation. Thus, he can take due account of the very real extent to which the Liberals conquered new fields at this time, while reaching an ultimately bleak verdict on their chances of perpetuating their political hegemony. The book as a whole is firmly structured and well argued. One could advance minor caveats about the curiously selective use of footnotes and also, despite the generally high finish in matters of style, about some oddly jarring passages, turning on repetitious phraseology. These are small blemishes in such a large book on so important a subject. The author has succeeded triumphantly in matching the challenge of the assignment. On this showing, the Paladin History of England is going to take its place alongside the Oxford and Longmans Series as the really solid and considerable textbooks for advanced work; and under present conditions Shannon ought to have cornered the market so far as his own period is concerned. P. F. CLARKE University College, London. GLADSTONE AND RADICALISM: The Reconstruction of Liberal Policy in Britain, 1885-1894. By Michael Barker. Harvester Press, 1975. Pp. viii, 308. £ 7.50. In this book Dr. Barker seeks to modify the stereotyped view of Gladstone after 1885 as a narrow, one-issue politician, ignorant of non-Irish reform, who acted as a drag on the development of Liberalism in the last decade of his career. This is surely a valid aim, for the analysis of Liberal politics in the later nineteenth century by D. A. Hamer, cogent and perceptive though it is, leaves one with an unduly negative picture of Liberalism in this period. Thus, the strength of Dr. Barker's approach is that he explains the attitudes of Liberals to the substance of, say, Home Rule legislation, not just to its political implications. His book is at its most interesting when he advances the argument that in the late 1880s Gladstone began to perceive the Irish case as a facet of the wider problem of labour in Britain which led him to attack the repression of workers' demonstrations in both countries, thereby widening his own social outlook and strengthening his reputation with the leaders of labour. By the 1890s Gladstone is to be found regularly donating money towards the election expenses of workingmen who stood as Liberal candidates.