SIANA. By ELLA LONN, Assistant Professor in
Grinnell College. G.P. Putnam's Sons, New York and London, 1919.
Pp. 538. Price $3.00 net.

Miss Lonn's book is an exhibition of the true scholarly spirit. Her
analysis of the situation in Louisiana politics during the period of
Reconstruction is most ably executed. She has neglected no source
which would throw light upon this very anachronistic epoch. Public
documents of all kinds, and especially those which embody the debates
in the Senate and assembly of Louisiana have been made to yield
interesting testimonies of the passing shows of the years 1867-1876.
Not content, however, with these testimonies, she has called to her
aid many other sources including the newspapers of the day wherein is
displayed popular reaction towards the orgies being indulged in the
State House. And thus the reader's mind, by means of most carefully
chosen quotations from these records, as if by a lightning flash, is
frequently illumined; so that the whole comedy unfolds before the eyes
in a most interesting fashion.

The book is not only filled with a wealth of detailed information
concerning the period, it not only tells the story of political
debauchery, ignorance and fraud; but notes also the few shreds of
constructive work done by the legislators under the coercion of public
opinion. All of these facts are put together in a logical manner and
show that the author is not only gifted with keen analytic powers, but
is also endowed with a peculiar faculty for organizing and marshalling
facts in such a manner as to weave a beautiful mosaic of otherwise
widely divergent elements.

Miss Lonn has succeeded in writing a very interesting narrative and
her book will hold the attention of a widely differing clientele. The
student of American politics will find an illuminative study of this
very remarkable period, and therefore much food for thought. But this
book offers to the lover of fiction a new field. There is the hero,
Warmoth, the villain, whose protraiture has been limned by a masterly
hand. Little by little, sometimes directly and sometimes indirectly;
sometimes by the words of his own mouth, oftener by the mouths of
those whom he attacked, and almost constantly by the unfriendly
newspapers, she deftly portrays the elements of his character. Warmoth
had almost unlimited power and he used it like Cataline to corrupt the
corruptible elements of the State. He was essentially a Nero, call