Welsh Journals

In Ships and Seamen of Gwynedd, by Aled Eames (Gwynedd Archives Service, 1976; 20pp; £ 1.00), the photographs are of brigs, schooners, barques of wood, iron and steel, and of the masters and men who sailed them in the late-nineteenth and early-twentieth centuries. Pages from the logs, glimpses of ship-building, wrecks and family groups illustrate that this was a way of life and an inherited tradition of seamanship for the people of north-west Wales. This is another excellent production by the Gwynedd Archives Service. The selection of photographs and the historical commentary are by Aled Eames, a pioneer in this field. It is to be hoped that other counties will follow the example of collecting, preserving and using such valuable, ephemeral material before it is lost. In Roy Douglas, Land, People and Politics (Alison and Busby, 1976. Pp. 239. £ 6.50), a lively account of the land question in British politics between 1878 and 1952, written from a strongly Liberal viewpoint, there is a brief discussion of the land question in late-nineteenth-century Wales. While this is welcome, it might be thought that Welsh agrarian develop- ments would merit more than six pages in a survey work of this kind, bearing in mind their impact on the tithe and disestablishment questions and the career of Lloyd George. In any case, Dr. David Howell's published work now wholly supersedes this short account. The following historical works were published by Penguin Books in 1977: John Bowie, The Imperial Achievement (Pp. 592, £1.95). A highly sympathetic survey of British imperialism from the fifteenth century to the twentieth. John Stevenson, Social Conditions in Britain between the Wars (Pp. 295. £ 1.75). A selection of writings on social problems in the inter-war period, including accounts of the condition of housing in Swansea and Merthyr in the thirties. Philip Mason, A Matter of Honour (Pp. 582, £ 2.50). A history of the officers and men of the Indian Army over two and a half centuries. Raymond Dawson, Imperial China (Pp. 377, £ 1.95). Chinese history from 589 to 1793. Mary McAulay, Politics and the Soviet Union (Pp. 352, £ 1 .50). An intro- ductory analysis to the political system of the USSR. Claire Tomalin, The Life and Death of Mary Wollstonecraft (Pp. 398, £ 1.50). A warm-hearted, colourful and committed account of the author of the Vindication of the Rights of Woman (1792). Kruschev Remembers, Vol. 1 (Pp. 669, £ 2.25) and Vol. 2 (Pp. 635, 12.25), memoirs with introduction and commentary by Edward Crankshaw. Victor E. Neuberg, Popular Literature; a history and Guide (Pp. 302, £ 2.95), a survey from the beginnings of printing to 1897.