one guess be said to be any nearer the fact than the other? May we not be
pardoned for treating all estimates as utterly fallacious that are not
based upon known facts and figures? Why do we hear so much of the
"approximate correctness" of so many statistical tables, when, in point
of fact, the primary data are incapable of proof, and the averages and
conclusions built upon them are all assumed? "Statisticians," says one of
the fraternity, "are generally held to be eminently practical people; on
the contrary, they are more given to theorizing than any other class of
writers; and are generally less expert in it."

In the presence of such gross discrepancies as these, by statisticians of
the highest repute, and among such a practical people as the English,
what value can be attached to the mere estimates of wealth which have
been attempted in the census of the United States? The careful
Superintendent of the Census of 1870 and 1880, the late Francis A.
Walker, writes concerning it:

"At the best, these figures represent but the opinion of one man, or of a
body of men, in the collection of material, and in the calculation of the
several elements of the public wealth." And in the last Census Report for
1890, the results of the so-called "census of wealth," are cautiously
submitted, "as showing in a general way a continuous increase in the
wealth of the nation, the exact proportions of which cannot be
measured."

Now, what are we to conclude regarding the attempt to elevate to a rank
in statistical science, mere estimates of private wealth, for a large
portion of which, by the statements of those who make them, no actual
statistical data exist? And when this is confessedly the case in our own
country, the only one attempting the impossible task of tabulating the
wealth of the people, what shall we say of the demand that is made upon
our credulity of accepting the guesses of Mr. Giffen, or Mr. Mulhall, as
to British wealth? Are we not justified in applying the old Latin
maxim--"_De non apparentibus, et de non existentibus, eadem est ratio_,"
and replying to those who demand of us to know how much any nation is
worth, that it is sometimes an important part of knowledge to know that
nothing can be known?

Among the literally innumerable inquiries liable to be made of a
librarian, here is one which may give him more than a moment's pause,
unless he is uncommonly well versed in American political
history--namely, "What was t