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travelled alone or in a group; their occupations; their ages; their places of residence; and their destinations. Computer processing was required for the successful manipula- tion of the resultant matrix.

This large data base provides the material for sixteen chapters each dealing with a single theme and building cumulatively towards an understanding of the motives for emigration and an initial exploration of Danish immigration patterns in the New World. This last topic, which is of course worthy of a volume in its own right, receives scant treatment and is the weakest section of a book which otherwise deserves high praise. The first three chapters serve as an introduction to the study and to the literature on emigration; the next nine treat the relationship between emigration on the one hand and age, sex, family structure and occupational structure on the other. In these chapters Hvidt adds not only to our substantive knowledge of the topic, but also explores the process of emigration showing how, for example, the emigrant followed a progression of stages through the urban hierarchy, how both sexes had a similar staged strategy, how emigration proceeded more rapidly from the better agricultural areas than from the poorer ones (since the peasant in the former areas had less hope of ever acquiring land), how family emigration was reduced by changes in the availability of land in the receiving area and how rates were accelerated by transatlantic contacts and remittances. The book is problem-oriented as well as descriptive. The chapters are short, averaging sixteen pages and are written in a simple clear style. The author makes good and liberal use of tables and graphs; effective use of maps is a feature of the chapters dealing with the overall pattern of emigration and the urban/rural dichotomy. One might wonder why other chapters were not treated in a similar way: would not maps of the physical environ- ment, of patterns of emigration among various occupations, of patterns of agricultural intensity and flows of remittance money have helped our understanding of these topics?

In the final chapter Hvidt explains the similarities and differences between internal and external migration, seeks to place his study in the context of demographic theory and discusses differences between Danish, Swedish and Norwegian emigration. In doing so he hopes to contribute to the search for generalizations on the larger topic of European emigration. The discussion of theory was perhaps included simply to meet the require- ments of a doctoral examination committee and is in the opinion of this reviewer unnecessary in a book that possesses such marked substantive merit. Nevertheless, this book will be read to advantage and with pleasure by those interested in the uprooting of the Old World and its transplantation in the New.

Carleton University JOHN CLARKE

J. M. POWELL and M. WILLIAMS (Eds), Australian Space, Australian Time (Melbourne: Oxford University Press, 1975. Pp. xii+256. $36.50)

This book is a collection of seven geographical essays which presents new and revised information as well as elaborating and outlining new perspectives on Australian develop- ment. It is a timely and valuable work based on the essayists’ own researches and on a growing volume of research papers produced by historical geographers, economic historians and others.

Although the essays vary in style, each is fluently presented and contributes to the clarification of important themes in the continent’s development. The opening chapter by Jeans is a short clear essay on the impress of central authority on the landscape. In many ways this is a fundamental chapter for although it concentrates on the formative years of New South Wales it highlights the role governments have played in the development of Australia, a continent where settlement has occurred, by and large, through direct government action. This essay provides a theme which is implicit in the remaining studies.

Conservation and resource management in Australia before 1860 are examined in an interesting essay by Powell. The essay concludes that within seventy years of European

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occupation, large areas of the natural scene had been irrevocably disfigured and native ecosystems, both fragile and robust, had been either totally destroyed or placed in jeopardy. The essay by Williams, titled ‘More and smaller is better: Australian rural settlement 1788-1914’, examines the theme of rural settlement and rural land legislation. It successfully adds clarity to a field noted for its profusion of detailed literature. A much needed new perspective on Australian urbanization is contributed by Dorothy Cloher in a chapter which attempts to formulate a conceptual framework for the historical treatment of urbanization. Her analysis of the urban system of Victoria from 1841 to 1891 in terms of an ecological-systemic approach provides a useful framework for the study of urbanization in the other Australian colonies, all of which were exhibiting by 1900 the trends that would make Australia one of the most highly urbanized countries of the twentieth-century world.

Australian manufacturing and transport developments are dealt with in two very different essays by researchers from the Australian National University, Professor Linge and Dr Rimmer. In a short chapter Linge outlines the growth of manufacturing in the six colonies as each started from “scratch and began the process of catching up with world technology”. The roles played by politicians, public servants and petitioners in the development of transport, with particular reference to Victoria, are closely examined and well researched by Rimmer. This essay, like Cloher’s, provides a useful framework for studies of the other Australian colonies. A fitting conclusion to the volume is Pro- fessor Robinson’s essay which deals with the development of the Federal system as the strength of the idea of “a whole Australia” asserted itself towards the close of the nineteenth century. In the light of the political discussions of the mid-1970s on the nature and form of Australia’s government, his chapter highlights the need for studies offering a perspective on this topic.

Criticisms of the book and of individual essays are minor and relate largely to incon- sistencies between individual essays and to the non-standardization of the inclusion of metric equivalents. Overall the editors and authors must be congratulated on the quality of the text. For students of Australia this work provides an invaluable guide, a source of information and a host of ideas for further research; Robinson, for example, indicates the need for study of patterns of voting behaviour at the 1898 and 1899 Federal referenda. It is hoped that the research which it will stimulate will be included in any later edition along with treatment of important themes omitted from the volume, particularly the role of pastoralism in Australian development. For the geographer seeking an understanding of Australian development and the present character of the nation, this book should be considered as essential reading.

University of Newcastle, NS. W. J. C. R. CAMM

NIELS STEENSGAARD, The Asian Trade Revolution of the Seventeenth Century: The East India Companies and the Decline of the Caravan Trade (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1974. Pp. 441. $15.00 and $4.95 softback)

The triumph of the English and Dutch East India Companies over pre-existing Oriental trade networks was pivotal in weighting the world’s economic balance in favour of Western Europe. Western advantages initially gained during the seventeenth century have not yet been lost and are reflected today in the tensions which divide Third and Fourth World countries from First World nations. Study of this Asian “trade revolu- tion” is particularly important for an understanding of the precedents of modern multi- national and trans-national corporations. Indeed, the diversion of East-West trade from the caravans and peddlers to the chartered European companies marked the inauguration of the global extension of Western economic and political institutions. First, of course, came the great age of European imperialism, followed by development of multi-national capitalist structures in the post-colonial period. The products of both