Welsh Journals

courts with that drawn from other sources so as to present a more rounded and balanced picture. There is some danger of the volume becoming a somewhat disconnected series of sketches and snapshots of James I's reign as seen from the judicial records. Nevertheless, the author has driven a notable furrow through a field which has too long lain fallow and has brought to light a mass of new information for which we all have reason to be thoroughly grateful. The book is divided into a brief introduction and four chapters: 'The Council of Wales, its presidents and problems', 'The Catholics and their fortunes'. 'The gentry and their interests', and 'The King's needs and Welsh resources'. The first chapter, concerning itself largely with opposition to the presidents from English border counties, is more of a study of the latter's reactions to the Council than those of Wales. It does, however, bring into focus some highly relevant information on James's sensitivity to the similarities he detected between his position in Wales and in Scotland and especially the risks which he perceived to both his royal prerogative and his policy in relation to Scotland to which a successful challenge to his authority by disaffected border squires might lead. The second chapter on the Roman Catholics provides important and fascinating new information about them, derived in large measure from proceedings taken against them in the courts. But the author does not spread his net wider to take any account of the religious beliefs and practices of the large non- Catholic majority of the population, and a more balanced account of religious allegiance in general would have been welcome. As he comes to investigate the gentry in his third chapter, Dr. Owen is clearly more at ease in recounting-as he does with wit and vigour-their feuds and rivalries than he is when looking at their trading or industrial interests. The latter inevitably tend to be represented only sporadically, and not necessarily typically, in court proceedings, and the chapter would have gained from a more systematic and less impressionistic consideration of the commercial and industrial activity of Wales at the time. The final chapter is a little thin in substance though it contains interesting material on contemporary attitudes towards the wastes and woodlands. Dr. Owen did not set out to provide a comprehensive account of Wales during James I's reign but has succeeded in giving a useful pioneering introduction to the way in which the country was seen from the courts at Westminster. GLANMOR WILLIAMS Swansea CLASS COMMUNITY AND THE LABOUR MOVEMENT: WALES AND CANADA, 1850-1930. Edited by Deian R. Hopkin and Gregory S. Kealey. Llafur/CCLH, 1989. Pp. 275. £ 6.95. This volume of essays is the result of a conference held at Gregynog under the auspices of the Society for Welsh Labour History (Llafur) and the Committee for